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With the score now 21–19, Hill kept his offense on the field, electing to tie the game with a two-point conversion. Lining up at the three-yard line, quarterback Jimmy Lewis pitched the ball to Payton, who was drifting left. Payton lowered his head, charged forward, and ran into a pair of Southern defenders at the goal line. He lunged forward, the upper half of his body clearly falling into the end zone. Several Jackson State players raised their hands, celebrating yet another Payton achievement. The crowd booed. Whistles were blown. Bates, the Southern coach, began thinking about the upcoming kickoff return.

Not so fast.

The five officials gathered in a small huddle, talked for another minute or two. Finally, a decree was issued. The ball had never crossed the goal line. No score. “The ref told me Walter’s knees had hit the ground first,” said Hill. “I couldn’t believe it. There was no way he didn’t score. No possible way.”

Payton grabbed the football and slammed it toward the turf in disgust. He ripped his helmet off his head and threw it aside. “No way!” he screamed. “No way in hell!”

The Jaguars held on for the 21–19 triumph, a crushing blow for Jackson State and for Payton. Though he ran for 113 yards and a touchdown against one of the nation’s best defenses, all was lost. In his mind, the defeat killed the Heisman hopes.

Upon returning to Jackson, Hill inspected all available photographs from the game. One in particular showed Payton stretched far across the goal line. He sent the picture to various media outposts, hoping to keep the Payton flame alight. The only news outlet to run the photograph was Jackson State’s own Blue and White Flash, which blew it up and placed it beneath a headline reading YOU BE THE REFEREE.

The game marked the last time Hill ever had Payton charge through the defense on a goal line play. Blessed with powerful legs and Bob Beamon–esque leaping ability, Payton would be better served going over—not through—packed-in opponents. “From that point on, we began a drill in practice,” said Hill. “I’d have all the linebackers hold hands, and Walter would have to fly over them without being pulled down.

“That’s how he learned to soar.”

With the loss to Southern, Walter Payton’s senior season was pretty much shot. The Tigers fell again, to Grambling, the following week, and then Payton shocked the coaching staff by sitting out a game against Bethune-Cookman with a mild knee injury (he was used solely as a kicker). The Tigers won their season finale with an emotional 19–13 win at Alcorn State, and Payton’s collegiate career was complete. After his final game, Payton, along with Connie and a couple of Tiger players, purchased two six-packs of Colt 45 Malt Liquor.

“I’m telling you, I chugalugged the first tall, cold can before Rickey (Young) had the car started again,” Payton wrote. “I guzzled the second, third, and fourth on the way, and I finished the fifth as we got out of the car. It hadn’t quite hit me as we walked in the door, but as I popped the top on number six and began sipping, I became so drunk I could hardly see.”

Connie, who never drank, was infuriated. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Walter Payton,” she lectured. “You’re just getting what you deserve.”

She was right. Payton spent the remainder of the night hunched over a toilet.

With Jackson State’s season over, the NFL’s personnel gurus continued to flock to campus to conduct workouts. Their praise was universal. As Tom Siler noted in his weekly Sporting News column: “Pro scouts, judging from my research, would prefer Payton to Griffin. He’s twenty pounds heavier [this was a tremendous exaggeration on the part of Jackson State’s coaches, who listed Payton as a six-foot-one, 215-pound bruiser with 4.3 speed]. Payton, the scouts say, is a great runner.” The Dallas Cowboys, owners of the second pick in the upcoming draft, were so wowed by Payton that they actually sent Hill a buffet of weight equipment to fill a sparse exercise room in Sampson Hall and make a good impression. The