49ers Go Back to Work, Do a Job on Patriots

The San Francisco 49ers hoped they had provided--for at least a few hours--some relief from the gloom caused by the earthquake.

“We felt like we had to give people something to be happy about, some kind of joy,” nose tackle Michael Carter said Sunday. “If football is it, that’s OK with us.”

The 49ers ran their record to 6-1 with a 37-20 victory over New England, as Steve Young replaced the injured Joe Montana late in the first half and threw three touchdown passes.

Team owner Edward J. DeBartolo Jr. said he thought the game, switched from Candlestick Park to Stanford Stadium, was needed. “We need the unifying situation, the common denominator,” he said.

A crowd estimated at 75,000 watched the first pro game played in the Bay Area since Tuesday’s devastating earthquake.

The Patriots (2-5) said they didn’t think about the quake once the game began. But linebacker Ed Reynolds said: “I don’t think a lot of us were crazy about coming out here to play. There was a lot of death out here. I thought we came here out of respect for the fans.”

Although the crowd seemed no different from any at National Football League stadiums across the nation, there was an anxious moment just as the game began.

San Francisco safety Jeff Fuller lay motionless on the field after making a tackle on the second play of the game. He was later diagnosed as sustaining compression fractures of vertebrae in his neck.

While the injury was not life-threatening, doctors said Fuller’s career may be jeopardized by nerve damage that could limit the use of his right arm.

San Francisco fans got another scare in the closing seconds of the first half when quarterback Joe Montana was carted off the field with an injured left knee. He jogged back to the sidelines in the fourth quarter, however, and team officials said he could have returned to the game, if needed.

Young, taking over after Montana sustained a slight knee sprain, completed 10 of 11 for 188 yards.

Jerry Rice caught two touchdown passes, a three-yarder from Montana in the second quarter that tied the game 7-7 and a 50-yarder from Young in the third quarter that broke a 17-17 tie.

Thirty-six-year-old Steve Grogan, who replaced Doug Flutie as the Patriots’ starting quarterback, threw touchdown passes of 55 and 19 yards to Stanley Morgan. The 19-yarder, midway through the third quarter, tied the game at 17-17.

After Rice’s second touchdown, Greg Davis kicked a 21-yard field goal midway in the fourth quarter to make it 24-20. But Young drove the 49ers downfield for the clinching touchdown, hitting John Taylor on a 43-yard scoring pass on third-and-17 with 3:15 to play.

Roger Craig broke the team record for career rushing scores with a two-yard run with 54 seconds remaining. Craig has 62, beating Ken Willard’s mark.

The Patriots opened the scoring 1:50 into the second quarter on Grogan’s 55-yard pass to Morgan. But the 49ers took the lead on Montana’s short touchdown pass to Rice and Mike Cofer’s 23-yard field goal.

Davis tied the game with a 49-yard field goal with 1:01 remaining in the half. But Young drove his team downfield and hit Wesley Walls with a one-yard touchdown pass on the final play of the half.

The 49ers were able to sell about 10,000 more tickets at Stanford, which has a larger capacity than 65,000-seat Candlestick Park. Proceeds from the extra tickets will go to the earthquake relief fund, 49ers officials said. It was the first NFL game ever relocated because of a natural disaster.