Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • 59

Section 5 Ghicago (Tribune Monday, December 25, 1978 And fans a blast Pastorini gives Oilers a present David Israel High-wire Falcons in another thriller out all week. He finally threw a little bit on Friday. There was never a doubt he would play." Pastorini, whose knee injury was believed to be considerably more serious than the cracked ribs which also forced Griese to miss work this week, was a far superior performer than the Dolphins' quarterback. Griese had a difficult time completing 11 of his 28 passes for 114 yards. He threw two interceptions, including one to Gregg Bingham which ignited the clinching Houston march.

Griese's aim was bad most of the time. And his receivers dropped passes frequently. "I'm not going to say my ribs didn't bother me," Griese said. "My timing was off. I was throwing high and probably too quick." "I'm not going to put this defeat on Griese," Shula said.

"We gave him a shot to numb the pain in his ribs. It appeared to me Continued on page 8, col. 4 Pastorini completed six of seven aerials for 66 yards, capping the drive with a 13-yard touchdown pass to Tim Wilson. "Dan is one of the toughest people who ever walked on a football field," declarea Houston Coach Bum Phillips after Pastorini had led the Oilers on subsequent drives of 53 yards to set up a 35-yard Tony Fritsch field goal and 50 yards before Campbell's 1-yard run for the clinching touchdown late in the final quarter. Pastorini, whose medical record this year resembles that of a survivor of the Bataan Death March, finished with 20 completions in 29 aerial attempts for 306 yards.

He didn't throw a single interception. He was sacked twice both times by Kim Bokamper on blitzes and he got up and returned to the huddle. "PASTORINI HAS been under incredible pressure," Phillips said. "He couldn't work embarrassed Bob Griese so badly that Coach Don Shula finally removed his top quarterback from further humiliation in the fourth quarter. The Christmas Eve triumph in the newest game of Rozelle Roulette, achieved before in the Orange Bowl, sent the Oilers into the quarterfinals of the Super Bowl tournament next Sunday against the New England Patriots in Foxboro, Mass.

PASTORINI, WEARING a special brace on the right knee he injured last week against San Diego, opened up the Oiler passing attack after the Dolphin defense ganged up on Earl Campbell. After Griese hit Andre Tillman with a 14-yard scoring pass following a fumble recovery to give Miami a 7-0 lead, Pastorini went to the air and led the Oilers 71 yards in 10 plays to a touchdown. Faking play action on nearly every pass, By Cooper Rollow Chicago Tribune Press Service MIAMI Dan Pastorini shook off a painful knee injury Sunday to lead the Houston Oilers past the Miami Dolphins and into the Phase II of the National Football League postseason playoffs. And after he had hobbled off the field with a 17-9 victory in the American Football Conference wild-card game, the brash and gritty Oiler quarterback cussed out the fans of Houston. "We survived a long season of adverse criticism," the 29-year-old Pastorini said.

"A lot of people in Houston don't like us very well. They've been running us down. "But there was never any doubt we could do the job." The gushing Oilers did a job on the Dolphins, all right. They thwarted the Miami offense, ripped apart the Miami defense, and Chicago Tribune Pr Service ATLANTA The Hotlanta Falcons, football's Flying Wal-lendas, the National Football League's only high wire act, the team that does not want to know it made the playoffs until the final week of the season, and does not want to feel like it won a game until there are only 10 seconds left, had the Philadelphia Eagles right where they wanted them up 13-0 with time running out. Performing without a net, the Falcons then did a couple of successful triple flips while swinging from a trapeze and crossed Niagara Falls on a tightwire while winds gusted about to beat the Eagles 14-13 and advance to the second round of the NFC playoffs, in which they will play the Cowboys Saturday in Dallas.

Hearts skipped a beat and knots tightened in stomachs, but the Falcons never worried. They knew exactly what they were doing here Sunday afternoon. They had, after all, been through this so many times before. They qualified to be one of the NFC wild card teams because they won four games this season in the final 10 seconds all by 20-17 scores, coin-cidentally and another one in the final 1:53. WELL THIS TIME It was hardlv close.

The Falcons scored their winning touchdown and extra point yes, Tim Mazzetti struck again with 1:39 left to play and had the whole thing neatly wrapped up with 13 seconds left when Philadelphia's Mike Michel missed a 34-yard field goal that would have been a winner for the Eagles. After 54 minutes of fumbles, holding penalties, blown opportunities, and conservative play calling all your basic NFL playoff game stuff the Falcons were warmed up and ready to get down to their thrill-a-second business. It started on a second down and 10 to go at the Atlanta 26 when Steve Bartkowski dropped back and connected with Wallace Francis on a disputed 49-yard hook-and-go pattern to the Philadelphia 25. The play was disputed because after some pushing and a little shoving, both Francis and Eagles' Free Safety John Sander! came down with the ball. "I THOUGHT THAT one big play down the middle was offensive interference," said Philadelphia Coach Dick Vermeil.

"The only reason the ball was there for Francis to catch was because there was offensive interference, pushing, shoving, and grabbing." "I had the ball all the way to the ground," Sanders said. "I caught the ball before he even got there. He never had it. He pushed me before the ball got there, and then he jumped on me and started rassling for the ball. Look at any kind of replay in the world and you'll see I caught the ball 111? v' MY''rh "t-ji i it-', fi ine t.

mMm.mtM jdl. in mm mtni mJ UPI Teiepnoto Philadelphia place kicker Mike Michel lies on the field in agony over missing a field-goal attempt that would have won for the Eagles. before he even got there." "There was a fight for the ball," said Francis. "Maybe he jumped first, but when the ball's in the air it's a free ball. I had my hands on it and he had his hands on it, and that's my ball." That is what the official said, anyway, and four plays later, Bartkowski, who completed 18 of 32 passes for 243 yards and two touchdowns, hit tight end Jim Mitchell for 20 yards and the first of those touchdowns.

There were 4 minutes, 56 seconds left to play. AFTER THE ensuing kick off, the Eagles failed to get a first down and punted. Michel's punt was short and Billy Ryckman's return was four yards backwards, but Cleveland Franklin who had recovered Ryckman's fumbled punt in the first quarter to set up Philadelphia's first touchdown-was flagged for an intentional face mask violation, and the Falcons had a first down on Philadelphia's 49-yard-line with three minutes left. Four plays and one offensive holding later, Francis ran another hook-and-go, got behind Sanders, Randy Logan, and Bobby Howard, and tumbled backwards into the end zone after catching Bartkowski's pass for a 37-yard touchdown. "The guy who was covering me went for the curl move," Francis said.

"And I went straight up." AND MAZZETTI, the reformed bartender from Smokey Joe's saloon in West Philadelphia, made good on the conversion against the team that had cut him earlier this season. The Eagles, however, were determined to make the Falcons slip and slide and use their balance rod desperately. Ron Jaworksi started completing passes to anyone who worked his way open and in 70 seconds with 27 seconds left to play Philadelphia had a first-and-10 at the Atlanta 16. But two passes to Harold Carmichael who caught five passes for 45 yards and a touchdown but was not the sive factor analysts had presumed he would be fell incomplete, and on third down with 17 seconds remaining, Vermeil sent in Michel to try a 34-yard field goal. "WE HAD NO time outs Vermeil explained, "and with 17 seconds left I didn't think I should take a chance running another play, because if we didn't get out of bounds we wouldn't have gotten to try the field goal." Whenever it was tried, the field goal was not going to be a cinch.

Michel, a second-year man out of Stanford, was signed to punt for the Eagles during the sixth week of the season. When Nick Mike-Mayer was hurt in the twelfth week of the season, Michel was forced into duty as the Eagles' place kicker. Before Sunday, however, he had never tried a field goal in a regular season NFL game. But in the third quarter, he was short and to the right on a 32-yard attempt. And in the fourth quarter he was wide to the right by about six inches on the field goal that might have made him as big a hero 'in Philadelphia as, the guy who invented cream cheese.

"I WAS HOPING I wonld get the chance," Michael said afterwards. "We were in good shape. We were on the good side fthe muddy field. Before the kick I was thinking about keeping my eye on the ball, concentrating, and swinging through. I did all those things.

And I thought it was good at first. But it didn't come back at all. Usually, I Continued on page 8, col. 1 Inside: alcons clip the Eagles mil itratu I IMG Willi inflicted on four other teams this year. "I DIDN'T LOOK," said Francis, who caught 6 passes for 135 yards.

"I couldn't." "Everything went just right," Michel said. "I just missed it. I was trying to get my foot into the ball and to concentrate. I did all that, but I still missed it. "I usually hook it.

I kept waiting for this one to hook, but it stayed straight." And as a result, Philadelphia's first meaningful postseason appearance since the 1960 title game came to an unhappy end. Atlanta Coach Leeman Bennett said he fully expected Michel to make the kick. "Sure I watched it," he said. "It's the only thing I could do. My thoughts at that time were that we had won a few games like that and maybe it was time for us to lose one." ADDING A FINE bit of irony to At- Continued on page 8, col.

5 quarterback Steve Bartkowski, who, battling a driving rain, threw two touchdown passes in the final five minutes. But the second TD, a 37-yarder to Wallace Francis, came with enough time in the game to give the Eagles a chance. Quarterback Ron Jaworski drove them to the Falcon 16, but on third down, with no time outs left, the Eagles called on Mike Michel for a 34-yard field goal. Here's where the luck comes in. Michel who is normally a punter, didn't become the Eagles place kicker until an injury knocked out kicker Nick Mike-Mayer four games before the end of the season.

He hadn't attempted a field goal until he missed a 42-yarder in the third quarter of Sunday's game, and had missed an extra point after the Eagles' first touchdown. This time, his kick sailed wide of the right upright wtih 13 seconds left, and the Falcons were spared the fate they From Tribune Wirt Service ATLANTA Having been accustomed to not moving ahead until the game's final 10 seconds, the Atlanta Falcons found themselves in the unfamiliar position of defending a lead for a whole 1 minute 39 seconds Sunday. They did it, but not without some help or some luck. The Falcons, who won four games in the final 10 seconds this year to make the National Football Conference playoffs for the first time in their 13-year history, scored twice in the final five minutes, wiping out a 13-0 Philadelphia lead and beating the Eagles 14-13 in the NFC wild card playoff game. Atlanta 10-7 plays at Dallas 12-4 in next week's NFC semifinal game.

Minnesota 8-7-1 will play at Los Angeles 124. "SOMEHOW, SOME way, the job always seems to get done," said Atlanta College basketball has become big business, with alumni playing a big role in some recruiting practices. Second of a series, page 3. Indiana basketball Coach Bobby Knight watched St. Joseph's Isiah Thomas, and was given a stamp of approval by the guard's mother.

Page 3. Rick Leach, Michigan quarterback, who had a hand in more TDs than anyone in college history, is the Big 10's MVP. Page 3. Illinois came out of the weekend with more confidence and considerably more respect by winning the Kentucky Invitational. Page 2.

-1 Pulfords keep love in the family "Where would I be without them. I really don't know. I know where I was when I first met them. Mixed up." Wanda Grissom i was through a friend who had been a babysitter for them. That's all I was for a while, but after a month or two, Bob would come home after the games and we would sit and talk.

"I didn't want to talk about myself at first because I didn't want to bother the family with all my problems. But the more and more they talked to me especially Bob the more and more I became motivated to do something with myself. "He really shaped my life, right down to writing out a program for me. I was in community college then, but I never had any intention of going on to anything further like now at Pepperdine. "After just starting out as their babysitter, I began to stay at their house more, like on weekends because I didn't want to go wherever I was living.

Then I started living with them all the time. "Originally I thought I would be just Continued on page 4, col. 4 By Bob Verdi THE PULFORD family, a clan of five, will be six strong at the Christmas dinner table Monday. And they'll all be family. That's not unusual for the Pulfords, or at least it hasn't been for three years since Wanda Grissom came into their lives and they into hers.

Wanda is 22 now, blond and healthy and vivacious and liberally splashed with- California sunshine. She's nearing graduation from Pepperdine University outside Los Angeles, and to say life is just beginning for her might be only a slight exaggeration. Because not long ago, as a teen-ager with five brothers, one sister, and no parents, Wanda was confused and purposeless, a sitting duck for drugs and depression, both of which she experienced frequently. SHE CAN only be thankful that Bob Pulford, now boss of the Black Hawks, was then coach of the Los Angeles Kings and in need of a babysitter occasionally. It's then her life took a right turn, and it's now that Wanda Grissom is like a daughter to Bob and wife, Roz, a sister to Jennifer, Lindsay and Robbie none of whom would think of having Christmas Day without her.

Or any other day. "Where would I be without them? I really don't know. I know where I was when I first met them. Mixed up," said Wanda at the Black Hawks' Christmas party one of several moments she'll have with her famUy during a two-week college break visit. "My father had died when I was 9 years ago last November.

I had no motivation to do anything, no reason, no direction. "My parents were great people. But I was so young when my father died that I needed someone to be one to me. And after he died, my mother became very depressed and sick. She died of cancer at 53.

"After that I really had no place to live. I lived with my brothers for a while, but that didn't work. And I lived with my sister and her boyfriend for awhile. That didn't work either. He knocked me around a few times, beat me up.

"WHEN I first met the Pulfords, It i-Ts -u I Tribune photo by Anne Cunck The Pulfords enjo Christmas on ice at the Black Hawks' party. Back; Roz Pulford, Wanda Grissom, Pulford. Front: Jennifer, Lindsay, Robbie. two years oia, and my mother died 4 Hi.