With a sweep of his cleated right foot, Harrison Butker achieved yet another indelible moment in a dream career. The former Georgia Tech star and Westminster grad delivered the game-winning kick for the Chiefs, a 27-yarder with eight seconds remaining that secured Super Bowl LVII over the Eagles Sunday night in Glendale, Ariz.
The game-winner atoned for a miss from 42 yards in the first quarter, a kick that bounced off the left upright and contributed to the Chiefs going into halftime down 24-14. Butker also made all five of his extra-point tries and had touchbacks on his first six kickoffs before squibbing the last with eight seconds remaining.
“That’s what you dream of as kicker – getting to the Super Bowl and have a game-winning kick,” Butker said after the game in comments recorded by WSB-TV. “It’s crazy to think that that’s now happened. What is it, a walk-off game-winner – I don’t know what it is when there’s time left on the clock. But it’s an amazing feeling.”
Chiefs coach Andy Reid showed his faith in Butker at game’s end. After a defensive holding penalty awarded the Chiefs offense a first down on the Eagles 11-yard line with 1:48 to play, Reid was content to run the clock down and put the game on Butker’s foot. Allowed free passage to the end zone by the Eagles defense in hopes of getting the ball back, Chiefs running back Jerick McKinnon stopped short of the end zone at the 2-yard line to maintain possession and set up the field goal. After quarterback Patrick Mahomes took a knee on third down, Reid called timeout with 11 seconds remaining, entrusting Butker to bring the Vince Lombardi Trophy back to Kansas City.
His confidence was well-founded. Butker drilled a 45-yard game-winner two weeks ago in the AFC title and in last year’s postseason forced overtime in consecutive playoff games with field goals from beyond 40 yards. When Butker ran out to attempt the game-winner Sunday night, he was a perfect 49-for-49 in his NFL career from 29 yards and in.
Earlier this week, Butker described how he handles big moments like the one he faced Sunday night with a process-oriented approach that called to mind the industrial-engineering degree he earned from Tech.
“I try to treat every kick like a big kick,” Butker told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution this week. “So whether that’s warmup kicks before the game, maybe the practice kicks leading up to the game, the extra point in the first quarter – all those kicks are big kicks. So when I do get to that big moment, I’ve been there before, I’ve done it. I think that gives me the best chance for success.”
On the kick, Butker planted his left foot and swung his right leg through the ball, sending the ball high and straight through the uprights. NFL uprights are 18 feet, 6 inches apart. Butker’s kick might have sailed cleanly through uprights six feet apart.
Butker could scarcely have scripted a more satisfying finish to the season than making the game-winner in the Super Bowl at State Farm Stadium. The year veered off course on the same field in the season opener against the Cardinals, when he rolled his left ankle on his first kickoff of the year. The injury forced him to miss four games – his first time out of the lineup since joining the Chiefs in 2017 – and his 75% field-goal percentage was the lowest of his career.
Butker has now earned two Super Bowl rings in six NFL seasons (he’s the third former Yellow Jacket to win two Super Bowls as a player, joining Bill Curry and Shaquille Mason) and ranks as the fourth most accurate kicker in NFL history. It is far more than Butker might have imagined for himself after he was signed by the Chiefs in September 2017 off of the Carolina Panthers practice squad. Butker was drafted in the seventh round out of Tech by the Panthers but lost a training-camp battle and was signed to the practice squad.
He has proven himself one of the NFL’s most trustworthy legs since then, providing further documentation Sunday that Chiefs fans won’t soon forget.
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