It was a brisk fall night at Dowdy-Ficklen stadium. The Marshall University football team had traveled south to Greenville, North Carolina to take on East Carolina University for their second to last game of the season.
The crowd roared as Marshall was down 14-17 with 30 seconds left in the fourth quarter. While Marshall attempted to get into field goal range, the referees called a controversial intentional grounding penalty that made a field goal impossible. The Herd lost in heartbreaking fashion. However, on that night, November 14, 1970, the heartbreak was just beginning.
To this day, students and faculty talk about what happened that night.