100 moments in 100 days: David Garrard’s scramble to beat the Steelers in the playoffs

This year marks the 25th season for the Jacksonville Jaguars. To celebrate, we’re counting down 100 days from our regular season kickoff with the top 100 moments in franchise history.

Today — we celebrate David Garrard, a fourth quarter scramble, and the only team to beat the Pittsburgh Steelers on their turf in a single season.

ESPN’s Mike DiRocco has an excellent breakdown of the entire play here — what coaches and players were thinking, the set up, the postgame feeling in the locker room, and more.

But I thought Garrard’s recollection of the run was great:

“I was in the shotgun,” Garrard said to DiRocco. “I saw, wow, they’re kind of giving it to me because they didn’t really have a linebacker lined up over there. That’s what happens when you do the trips. You put everybody to the right and everybody slides to stop the pass. They’re thinking, ‘They’re trying to throw a short quick pass to get somebody open.’ They did extra covering those guys and basically left the middle open. ...

“Mojo [Maurice Jones-Drew] was lined up next to me. He goes through and takes his linebacker out. All I had to do was make it through the line and basically fall forward for 2 yards. When I get through there’s nobody there and there’s only the safety [Tyrone Carter] coming down. I knew I had the first down and I thought, ‘We’re good right now.’ I thought, ‘I’m going to win this thing all by myself here.’ Then I realized I’m not that fast and the safety caught me from behind at the [11]-yard line. …

”I felt him grab me from behind and I thought, ‘Don’t fumble the ball. Hold on to the ball; squeeze it tight.’ My wife was telling me all year long, protect the ball like it’s our son. We had just had our son in Week 4, so you can see me cradling the ball and putting two arms around it.”

Send us your favorite moments and we’ll dig into each one until the Jaguars kick off on September 8th — including whatever video, audio, or stories we can find.

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