ReZoom

How photographer Robert Stinnett captured both the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat in one incredible shot while witnessing ''The Play.''"The most amazing, sensational, dramatic, heart-rending, exciting, thrilling finish in the history of college football."

The Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band took the field when Cal's Dwight Garner looked as if he had been tackled back at the 45 yard line. Big mistake.

That's what KGO sports announcer Joe Starkey declared not long after the University of California, Berkeley Golden Bears defeated rival Stanford University Cardinals in the final seconds of the 85th annual Big Game, which took place in November, 1982.

It is a play – and to most college football fans, it is known simply as The Play – that must be seen to be believed: Stanford was leading 20-19 (thanks to a 35-yard field goal set up by quarterback John Elway) when they kicked off with four seconds left in the game. The expected squib was picked up by Kevin Moen at mid-field. After scrambling, Moen lateraled the ball to Richard Rodgers. Rodgers took the ball to the Cal sideline before tossing it back to Dwight Garner who, just before being brought down by a pack of Cardinals, tossed the ball back to Rodgers. Rodgers brought the ball to the middle of the field and tossed it to Mariet Ford, who took it all the way down to the Stanford 25 before throwing a blind lateral to Kevin Moen.

This is when things get really sensational: After picking up a key block, Moen began charging past members of the Stanford marching band, who had streamed out onto the field in celebration of Stanford's imminent victory. As various band members scurried out of the way, Moen found himself with a virtual corridor leading into the end zone.

Caught up in the throes of glorious victory (not to mention the first touchdown of his college career), Moen capped off his end zone run by flattening lead trombonist Gary Tyrrell, sending his instrument flying. Luckily – or unluckily, if you happen to be Gary Tyrell – Robert Stinnett, a veteran photographer with the Oakland Tribune, was standing by to capture the collision.

"I wasn't really watching the game," Stinnett said. "I was there on special assignment, to get the passing of the Stanford Axe to whoever won. But as a photographer, you're trained to watch for the new and different, and when I noticed all these Cal players coming into the end zone and the Stanford band all making way for them, I just started clicking away. I didn't even get anybody's name."

Initially buried by Tribune editors, Stinnett's photograph of the collision appeared in newspapers across the country once it was picked up by the Associated Press. After a year or so, thanks to a specials on the then-fledgling ESPN network and a 7,500-word article in Sports Illustrated entitled "The Anatomy of a Miracle," the Oakland Tribune started selling copies of Stinnet's shot for five bucks apiece.

Cal's Kevin Moen graduated the next spring and became a real estate broker with Rolling Hills Estates in southern California, while Stanford trombonist Gary Tyrrell became the chief financial officer for the Woodside Fund, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm. (A 20th anniversary story in Stanford's alumni magazine claims the two have become pretty good friends as a result of their infamous linkage.)

Photographer Robert Stinnett retired from the Oakland Tribune in 1986 and has gone on to become a renowned military historian. He is author of "Day of Deceit: The Truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor" and "George Bush: His World War II Years." Strangely, his author bio makes no mention of his involvement in college football lore.

Number ten in our "Our Defining Moments" series, an ongoing ReZoom.com feature looking back on the moments that, through the power of photography, have been emblazoned into our collective consciousness. To see another pigskin-related "Our Defining Moments," click here.