Patriots Run Down Dolphins, 31-14 : They Force Six Turnovers Again; Miami Turns Over Title

Guess who’s coming to the Super Bowl?

It’s not the Jets, Raiders or Dolphins, all of whom were favored over the one-time Patsies of Foxboro, hereinafter known as the New England Patriots, champions of the AFC and now the Bears’ next victim, er, worthy foe.

On a soggy Sunday in the Orange Bowl, the Patriots did what they do best--run the football, pick up fumbles--and squished the fish, or to be more precise, mauled the mammals.

In English, they beat the Dolphins, 31-14, and moved on, leaving another foe muttering into its off-season.

The Patriots were four-point underdogs at the Meadowlands, where they won and became five-point underdogs in Los Angeles. They won and became six-point underdogs here.

Having also lost earlier to the Bears, in a game in which they got over the 50-yard line for two plays all day, the Patriots may well be seven-point underdogs or worse.

For the big powers of the AFC, however, this just wasn’t their post-season.

“I’m very disappointed in the way we played,” Dolphin Coach Don Shula said. “You work hard, get into the championship game, turn the season around, come from 5-4 and get the streak going and then play as poorly as we played. . . . “

If you do all that, then you’ll be on vacation. The Dolphins are, after losing four fumbles and throwing two interceptions for a grand total of six turnovers, tying last week’s Raider total.

The Patriots have now caused 16 turnovers in the playoffs, although there’s a question whether they’ve been taking the ball away, or merely picking it up after someone dropped it under slight duress. Sammy Seale did that on a kickoff last week, as did Tony Nathan on the first Dolphin play from scrimmage, Dan Marino on a botched snap, and Lorenzo Hampton on the second-half kickoff.

Shula: “The bottom line is, it was on the ground.”

To give the Patriots their due, they played good, tough football and gave their opponent every chance to expose its weakness.

The Dolphins had had trouble defending against the rush and the Patriots rammed it down their gullets all day. The final totals were 255 yards (105 for Craig James), 59 rushes and 39:51 of possession, to Miami’s 20:09.

Thus perished one of the NFL’s great jinxes. New England had lost 18 in a row here, winning only in 1966 when the Dolphins were an expansion franchise and Flipper was their biggest star.

The Dolphins, the defending AFC champions, had won 18 of their last 19 here against all opponents when this day started, wet, gloomy and about to get gloomier.

The first time the Dolphins touched the ball, they gave it to reliable Tony Nathan, who went into the middle of the line and fumbled the ball away at his 20.

The Patriots recovered and marched to the one, before the Dolphins turned them around. Tony Franklin kicked a 23-yard field goal and it was 3-0.

Hampton, the Dolphins’ No. 1 draft choice, then fumbled the ensuing kickoff up into the air, although he recovered that one, himself. Just tuning up, it turned out.

Form began to assert itself. Late in the first period, Marino took the Dolphins on one of those long, slow 80-yard marches he dislikes so much but are all that is left to him by secondaries that won’t let his sprinters get deep.

It took 11 plays, including four Marino completions, the last a 10-yarder to tight end Dan Johnson in the end zone. Duck soup. Danny was just going to nickel-and-dime them all day, right?

Remember what happened when the Raiders went ahead, 17-7 the week before? The Patriots drove 80 yards on them and turned it into a race again.

Trailing 7-3, the Patriots went 66 yards, highlighted by the play of the game, a 45-yard run by second-string halfback Robert Weathers. On a third-and-one, he started off left tackle and got a block from the second tight end, Derrick Ramsey on the outside linebacker on that side, Hugh Green. Green is a recent acquisition from Tampa Bay, having paid $335,000 to buy out his own contract. A welcome addition, he is nevertheless not what he was a few years ago, when he was a near peer of Lawrence Taylor.

Down he went. Weathers turned the corner on the Miami free safety, Bud Brown, who just flagged at him. Then Weathers bolted down the open sideline, right past Shula, for 25 more yards until he reached Miami cornerback Paul Lankford, and ran right through him before the pack finally dragged him down at the Miami seven.

Weathers: “Our coaching staff thought we should use fresh backs, so Mosi (Tatupu) and I were in there, to run inside against their big guys. (Grinning) To let them destroy us. Then Craig and Tony (Collins) would go back in.

“I was just trying to get the first down. If you run for four yards, the big ones will come. I slipped to the outside and there it was. When you’re hungry to run and to play, those things will happen.”

Shula: “The thing that disappointed me, at times I felt we were doing the job at the point (of attack), but they would bounce outside and we’d miss tackles. The one down the sideline in front of us--it’s so disappointing to see it happen to your defense.”

There was more disappointment in store.

With third-and-goal at the Miami four, Patriot quarterback Tony Eason dropped back and pump-faked to Collins, who was covered in the end zone by Bud Brown. Collins, who’d turned out, cut back the other way while the Patriot line kept the Dolphin rush walled off. Eason had enough time to pull the ball down, load up again and hit Collins. Franklin kicked the extra point and the Patriots led, 10-7.

This was, of course, nothing Marino couldn’t get back. Except that he pulled away from center too soon on the ensuing possession and fumbled the ball away at his 36.

In marched the Patriots once more, Eason hitting Ramsey with a one-yard pass for the touchdown. Franklin’s kick made it 17-7.

OK, everyone knew what the script was now: Marino brings ‘em back from the brink, etc.

Even if it wouldn’t be easy. The Dolphin two-minute drill set up just before halftime.

On first down, Marino tried a screen pass to Nathan, who couldn’t hold the ball. It was close to being a fumble, but was ruled incomplete.

On second down, Marino almost hit Patriot linebacker Don Blackmon, who had nothing but open field before him. Blackmon dropped the ball.

On third down Marino was sacked.

OK, so he’d have to bring the Dolphins back in the second half.

“What did I say at the half?” Shula said. “That we’d played about as bad as you can play and we still had a chance to get back in the ball game. ‘Bout the same thing I said at the half of the Cleveland game.”

Actually, the Dolphins hadn’t yet played as badly as they could play. They still had room for Hampton’s second kickoff fumble, to open the second half. He didn’t recover this one. The Patriots’ Ricky Hawthorne did. It was the third fumbled kickoff the Patriots had recovered in the playoffs.

The other two, they’d run right into the end zone. This one was at the Miami 25, so they had to march it in.

They got to the two, where it was fourth-and-one. Coach Ray Berry went for it and had Eason play-fake to Tatupu. He did, and then found Weathers open in the end zone.

Weathers: “That wasn’t designed for me. I was a decoy for our tight end. But their safety blitzed and left me. Tony threw me a lob about 30 yards in the air. I waited for it patiently. Hardest catch I ever made in my life.”

It was 24-7. The week before, the Dolphins had come from 21-3 behind in the third period, but that was against the 8-8 Browns. This was a different kettle of fishermen.

There was still time for the Patriots’ Roland James to fumble away two straight punts, and for Marino to throw a 10-yard scoring pass to Nathan.

There was, however, also time for Miami’s Joe Carter to lose fumble No. 4 and for Marino to throw two interceptions.

Midway through the fourth quarter, the Patriots marched 45 yards after Carter’s fumble, Tatupu going the final one for a 31-14 lead.

On the sideline, Denny Dolfan, the local cheerleader, hung his head. Miami fans began departing in droves. The 13,000 Patriot faithful stayed until the last fish was squished.