America was in the middle of a painful transition, and in the middle of this The Game was going to serve as a comforting diversion, if only for an afternoon.

Ivy League games ganernered national attention back then, and this one was as big as it could get.

Yale entered The Game with a string of 16 consecutive victories and possessed one of the nation’s most dominant offensive attacks.

Led by future NFL Rookie of the Year tailback Calvin Hill and their living legend of a quarterback Brian Dowling, the Bulldogs were averaging 456 yards per game. Hill was averaging over five yards a carry on the ground, and the senior Dowling hadn’t lost a a single game since his sophomore season—in high school.

So, despite possessing the nation’s No. 1 defense (nicknamed the “Boston Stranglers”), Harvard was the underdog.

Eli Coach Carmen Cozza was so confident that the week before The Game he told The Crimson, “I don’t think Harvard can beat us.”

The demand for tickets was unparalleled.

Harvard’s athletic department instated a system that, after filling requests from fellows, trustees, professors and students, gave priority to alumni by graduation year, with the oldest alumni having the first chance to purchase tickets.

Members of the class of 1949 bought the final tickets of the 40,000 sold. Nearly 50,000 ticket orders could not be filled.

“We could have sold 100,000 tickets, including those sold at Yale,” Gordon M. Page, Harvard’s ticket manager said the week before The Game.

Everyone, it seems, knew that something special would take place on that Saturday afternoon in the nation’s oldest football venue.

“Harvard beats Yale, 29-29”

The Ivy League title and the respect of a nation were on the line, and Yale spent the first half of the game proving why it was everyone’s favorite. The No. 18 Elis—ranked behind the likes of Alabama and USC because there was no Division I-AA back then—plowed its way to a 22-0 lead as Dowling tossed two touchdowns and ran for one more.

But The Game was far from over.