ATHENS — Larry Munson’s call of Kevin Butler’s 60-yard, game-winning field goal against Clemson in 1984 is the stuff of legend and lives on 40 years later. But Butler himself credits his mom, Sharon, for producing the best line from that whole experience.
When Butler told his mother he received a standing ovation when he walked into his UGA classroom the following Monday morning, Sharon Butler deadpanned, “was it for the kick or because you showed up for class?”
Nothing like family to keep one grounded.
Butler needed it then. Four decades ago, he was practically walking on air as he traversed Georgia’s campus.
That was the case well before the senior placekicker from Stone Mountain lined up with 11 seconds remaining to “try to kick one 100,000 miles,” as Munson described it the moment. As has been historically preserved, Butler made it with quite a bit of room to spare to give Georgia a 26-23 victory.
While it wasn’t quite 100,000 miles, the actual kick was a good bit over 60 yards — closer to 61 really — and remains the longest in school history. Now 62 years old, fully gray and awaiting the birth of his sixth grandchild, Butler still remembers every detail about that field goal, which solidified his status as a UGA legend.
The 40th anniversary of that kick is why Butler was chosen to serve as honorary captain for the Bulldogs when they renew their rivalry with Clemson on Saturday in the Aflac Kickoff Game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium (noon, ABC). Butler also will be feted at the Atlanta Athletic Club on Wednesday and on Friday night at the College Football Hall of Fame, where he became the first placekicker enshrined in 2001.
Butler kicked a lot of field goals in his four seasons at Georgia. Seventy-seven, in fact, which along with 122 extra points gave him 353 points scored, then a school and SEC record. The Bulldogs were 38-8-2 record with the Redan High graduate handling placement kicks.
But the field goal that had Munson screaming “Oh my God, oh my God!” and left Sanford Stadium “worse than bonkers” remains the one for which Butler is identified to this day.
“It’s crazy. You look back and it’s 40 years and that kind of puts life in perspective,” said Butler, who runs an Atlanta-based business development company these days. “But honestly, I thought about this (anniversary) coming two or three years ago when they scheduled this game. When they said they were gonna play in ‘24, I thought, ‘wow, that’ll be 40 years ago.’ I’m really excited about it.”
Butler was really excited about his kick sailing through the uprights that Saturday afternoon, too. The ensuing on-field celebration is Butler’s most poignant memory about that historic field goal.
After the ball cleared the crossbar, Butler turned from the west goal posts and ran toward the east end zone, leaping into a perfectly-executed, knees-first slide that would please the most accomplished soccer player. But between the Butler’s own exuberance and the momentousness of the kick, Georgia’s entire sideline also exploded into a spontaneous frenzy that spilled onto the field of play.
About this, Georgia coach Vince Dooley was not at all happy. He knew that several seconds remained on the game’s clock and yellow flags already were flying before Dooley and his staff could corral players, cheerleaders and various “others” and direct them back outside the boundary line.
“I messed up and celebrated too hard,” Butler said with a laugh. “I ran down there like there was no time left and there was still 7 or 8 seconds left.”
Radio sideline reporter Loran Smith was nearly knocked to the ground by the crazed throng rushing the field.
“His celebration almost cost us the game,” said Smith, who enjoys razzing his broadcast partner about the ensuing drama. “Kevin never talks about that. His kicked was followed by one of the most bone-headed plays in Georgia history. That was maddest I’d seen Vince in a while.”
The Bulldogs’ legendary head coach spent most of that gorgeous Saturday afternoon angry. In those days, the Clemson-Georgia rivalry was about as intense as one could get. They played annually, often with national championship implications on the line.
So, when Georgia went into its halftime locker room trailing the Tigers 20-6 at home, Dooley was incensed.
“I recall Vince coming in and throwing a chair,” Butler said, laughing at the memory. “That got everybody’s attention. He was miffed because we just weren’t playing like a Georgia team. It’s not that we weren’t winning, it was how we were playing.”
In a series long dominated by the Bulldogs, Clemson was giving Georgia fits in this particular period. Georgia won 20-16 in 1980 on the way to an undefeated, national championship season. The Tigers paid them back in kind the next year, winning 13-3 at Clemson Memorial on a day the Bulldogs turned the ball over nine times. Clemson, too, enjoyed an undefeated run to the national title that season.
Back in Athens in 1982, Georgia pulled out a 13-7 victory with Herschel Walker serving only as a very effective decoy due to a broken thumb. In ‘83, the year before Butler’s record kick, the schools tied 16-all.
Through it all, field goals played a huge part in the drama. Georgia clearly had the best place-kicker in all of college football in Butler, a two-time All-American and four-time All-SEC player. But in Donald Igwebuike, Clemson had maybe the next-best.
They traded kicks the way boxers trade punches both that day and the season before. The ‘83 game ended with Igwebuike missing a 67-yard try and, leaving one second remaining on the clock. Then Butler missed from 66 yards in a 16-16 tie.
On Sept. 22, 1984, the opposing kickers had made three field goals apiece before Butler nailed the record-breaker. But the problem with the 15-yard excessive celebration penalty is it meant that Georgia would have to kick off from its own 25-yard line.
To Butler’s chagrin — “I would’ve rather just tried to boom it,” he said — the Bulldogs elected to “squib” the ensuing kickoff. Fielded at the 20 by Ray Williams, the Clemson returner advanced the ball about 10 yards up the right hash before stopping and throwing left to Terrance Roulhac. Roulhac hauled in the backward pass and broke free down the sideline and well into Georgia territory. He was finally knocked out of bounds around the Georgia 35-yard line. Only after considerable debate did the head official declare the game over.
“I thought there was one second left on the clock when our boy went out of bounds,” Clemson coach Danny Ford complained after the game. “And there was a flag for a late hit, too. I tried to find the official but couldn’t.”
Igwebuike would have been quite capable of making what would have been a 52-yard try. He wasn’t given the chance.
“Being the game was at Georgia, the real hero could have been the clock operator,” Butler quipped.
According to the official record, that person’s name was Ed Dudley. But it’s Kevin Butler who is remembered for making the greatest kick in Georgia history. And what followed, he says, was one of the greatest nights in UGA history.
Butler made a lot of great kicks before and after that. His legend was launched in Atlanta in 1979 with a 44-yard game-winner for Redan High to beat Marist for the state championship. And a year making “The Kick” at Georgia in 1984, he’d win a Super Bowl with the Chicago Bears. Butler played 11 NFL seasons for the Bears. He finished as the team’s all-time leading scorer with 1,116 points, a record that he held until October 11, 2015, when it was broken by kicker Robbie Gould.
But it’s kicking for the Bulldogs that Butler will always be remembered. You can hear him on the radio every fall Saturday co-hosting with Jeff Dantzler on the “Georgia Tailgate” and “Georgia Postgame” shows and one Sundays for the “Bulldog Brunch.”
That Butler gets to ring in the 40th anniversary of “The Kick” while watching the Bulldogs and Clemson in a Top 15 matchup at Mercedes-Benz Stadium is “one helluva note.”
“That’s pretty special,” Butler said. “This game has all the bells and whistles, plus some great history. There’s been a lot of big plays and big kicks in this rivalry by both schools.”
None bigger, though, than the one that Butler kicked “100,000 miles.”
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