The SF 49ers have had incredible playoff moments, and Wild Card weekend has provided no shortage of excitement and crazy outcomes.
The 2020 SF 49ers fell short of their goal to get back to the Super Bowl and win it this time, ultimately finishing with a 6-10 record in a year where injuries defined the primary outcome.
So that means the Niners won’t be enjoying yet another wild Wild Card weekend of games, instead watching as other top-contending teams from around the league battle it out for the right to advance into the divisional round.
Fortunately, San Francisco can proudly look back at some crazy playoff moments of its own during its storied history. There’s no shortage of Super Bowl wins, crazy postseason upsets and clutch moments where the SF 49ers created highlight-reel memories the fanbase would talk about for generations.
And a number of those came during Wild Card weekend, too.
Unfortunately, not all the Wild Card moments are great ones, but that doesn’t eliminate them from being classified as insane outcomes.
Let’s go back through the Niners’ postseason history and rank out the five craziest Wild Card games San Francisco has played.
No. 5: NY Giants stun the SF 49ers in 1985
Final Score: NY Giants 17, SF 49ers 3
Again, not all Wild Card games have gone the SF 49ers’ way, and such was the case at the end of the 1985 season.
Fans may recall the year before when the Niners won the Super Bowl behind the 1984 squad, which was widely viewed as the most dominant team in franchise history. Much of that same squad was back, only San Francisco added a prolific wide receiver by the name of Jerry Rice.
But Rice and quarterback Joe Montana weren’t much of a match for a stout NY Giants defense that held the SF 49ers to a mere 362 yards of total offense while sacking Montana four times and forcing an interception.
”I thought our defense did as good as it ever did,” then-Giants head coach Bill Parcells told the New York Times after the game. ”Those were the world champions. Somebody had to get rid of them. I’m glad we did.”
If there was any vindication for the Niners, the Giants were defensively dominated by the eventual Super Bowl-winning Chicago Bears the following week, failing to score in a 21-0 Bears victory.
Still, for the defending Super Bowl champs to be limited to just three points in their follow-up campaign was quite the shocker.
No. 4: SF 49ers shut out the Eagles in 1996
Final Score: SF 49ers 14, Eagles 0
1996 was a challenging season for San Francisco, as quarterback Steve Young missed four games with an injury and the team had to navigate a gauntlet of three road bouts over the final five games to get into the postseason, still ultimately finishing with an impressive 12-4 record during the regular season.
But that led to a date with the 10-6 Philadelphia Eagles who boasted the league’s ninth-best scoring offense that year and were looking to pull off the road upset at Candlestick Park.
Well, the SF 49ers said no to that.
Granted, the Eagles did a good job to curtail the Niners offense led by quarterback Steve Young, Jerry Rice and an up-and-coming wide receiver named Terrell Owens. Yet what Philly didn’t count on was San Francisco’s defense, which ranked No. 4 in scoring during the regular season and got an MVP-caliber performance in the game from defensive lineman Bryant Young, who sacked Eagles quarterback Ty Detmer twice in the game.
Detmer also tossed two interceptions in the 14-0 shutout, which also saw Young rush one touchdown in with Rice adding another.
Shutouts are rare in the playoffs, yet the SF 49ers added one to their long list of storybook postseason games here.
No. 3: SF 49ers pull off an ‘Ice Bowl’ win over the Packers in 2014
Final Score: SF 49ers 23, Packers 20
While the Green Bay Packers were the proverbial “playoff thorn” in the Niners’ sides for much of the late 1990s, San Francisco got its vengeance in the postseason in the early 2010s before backing it up again in 2019, although that final bout was in the NFC Championship game.
A year after eliminating Green Bay in the divisional round in 2013, thanks to the mad-running ways from quarterback Colin Kaepernick, head coach Jim Harbaugh and Co. had to travel to a frozen Lambeau Field for a crucial road Wild Card matchup on Jan. 5, 2014, when the kickoff temperature was an icy five degrees Fahrenheit.
Crazy to think there were players playing in short-sleeve shirts, although Harbaugh sure looked bundled up in his puffy khakis.
Kaepernick wasn’t exactly the dominant force like he was the year before, tossing one touchdown against an interception and getting sacked three times. But he was efficient enough while continuing to be a pain in the next on the ground for Green Bay’s defense.
San Francisco’s defense also frustrated Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers enough, too, sacking him four times in the back-and-forth contest before SF 49ers kicker Phil Dawson netted the game-winning field goal as time expired.
“It’s not that cold,” Kaepernick told reporters after the game. “It’s all mental.”
Well, for the Packers it was. And Niners fans watching sure had to be happy they got to enjoy the win from (hopefully) the comfort of a warm venue.
No. 2: SF 49ers pull off epic win over Packers with ‘The Catch II’
Final Score: SF 49ers 30, Packers 27
The previous two Wild Card wins were pretty epic for San Francisco, but neither holds a chance of upsetting the No. 2 all-time SF 49ers Wild Card game.
Those Packers were a pain for the Niners in the late 1990s, as quarterback Brett Favre regularly upset Steve Young and Co. in the postseason. And it seemed to be the very same case again in the 1999 Wild Card game at Candlestick Park, which saw a back-and-forth contest stretch deep into the fourth quarter.
Green Bay took a 27-23 lead with two minutes left in regulation, thanks to a 15-yard touchdown pass from Favre to wide receiver Antonio Freeman.
Meanwhile, Young saw Terrell Owens drop pass after pass during the game. But with mere seconds remaining, the two Hall of Famers connected in what could be considered the second greatest single play in SF 49ers history:
The game-winning touchdown would go on to become known as “The Catch II,” recalling the late great, Dwight Clark’s heroics in the 1982 NFC Championship game years before.
But this magic in 1999 was special in its own way.
Young finally beat Favre. The SF 49ers finally beat the Packers. And the game created one of the best individual moments in franchise history.
No. 1: SF 49ers stage the ‘comeback of comebacks’ vs NY Giants
Final Score: SF 49ers 39, NY Giants 38
There can be no greater Niners Wild Card game than this one, right? And it’s likely fans will never see anything quite like this again.
San Francisco was all but done on Jan. 5, 2003 against the visiting Giants. New York got out to a whopping 38-14 lead with just over four minutes left in the third quarter. Even if the SF 49ers made things interesting in the fourth and final frame, overcoming a 24-point lead would be next to impossible.
“Next” being the key word here.
Because that’s exactly what Terrell Owens, quarterback Jeff Garcia and the rest of the Niners did. Owens and Garcia connected for San Francisco’s next two scores, one before the fourth quarter and another shortly after it started.
Just liked that, 38-30. A ballgame.
The SF 49ers added a field goal with 7:49 left in regulation to make it 38-33, and Garcia completed the epic comeback by finding wide receiver Tai Streets with a minute to go to make it 39-38.
Then that botched last-second Giants field-goal attempt and ineligible player downfield with six seconds left, and the game was essentially over.
“It’s one of those things where you’re in the park playing with your buddies,” Garcia told ESPN after the game. “You try to emulate what the great ones do, what Joe Montana and Steve Young did. Now I’m that guy. Maybe some kid wants to be Jeff Garcia. That’s an awesome feeling.”
Yeah, it was an awesome feeling for Niners fans, too.