At the time, the home field for the NFL Championship Game alternated between the two conferences; even-numbered years were hosted by the Eastern and odd-numbered by the Western.
Tickets for the game sold for ten dollars,[1] and kickoff was just after 3 p.m. CST,[3] televised by CBS, following the AFL Championship from Buffalo on NBC.
Lombardi also installed a special offense for the game, knowing that the Cowboys had spent time preparing to stop plays like the Packers sweep.
Later Pitts took a circle route pass over the middle from Bart Starr at the Cowboy 5 and broke a tackle by Warren Livingston to cap a 17-yard touchdown play.
Then Cowboys defensive back Mel Renfro fumbled the ensuing kickoff, and Packer rookie Jim Grabowski returned it 18 yards to give Green Bay a 14–0 lead before Dallas's first play.
Dallas responded with a 68-yard drive to the Packers 4-yard line, featuring a 40-yard completion from Don Meredith to a wide-open Reeves, but could go no further and settled for an 11-yard Danny Villanueva field goal, cutting their deficit to 21–17.
Green Bay had a chance to retake a 7-point lead before halftime, but Don Chandler's 30-yard field goal attempt was blocked by Cowboys tackle Ralph Neely.
From the Dallas 16 Starr hit Boyd Dowler cutting across the field for his third touchdown pass of the game, giving the Pack a 28–20 lead going into the fourth quarter.
But on third and nineteen, the Packers picked up a Cowboy blitz and Starr threw a 28-yard touchdown pass to Max McGee (who replaced the injured Dowler).
However, defensive tackle Bob Lilly kept his team in the game by blocking Chandler's extra point attempt, keeping the deficit at 2 scores, 34–20, rather than 3.
Now faced with 4th down, a heavy rush from the Dallas defense caused Chandler's punt to go just 17 yards, giving the Cowboys the ball on the Green Bay 47-yard line with 2:12 remaining.
Reeves had been scratched in the eye on his previous run but did not come out of the game in favor of rookie Walt Garrison despite clouded vision, another mental error.
Packer linebacker Dave Robinson recognized the play from films, brushed Hayes aside, stormed into the Cowboy backfield and enveloped Meredith.
Somehow Meredith got a wobbly sidearm toss away, but Tom Brown intercepted the pass in the end zone as the intended receiver, Hayes, was surrounded by Packers defenders.
With the win, the Packers earned their tenth NFL championship; it was their second in a row and fourth in six seasons under Lombardi, in his eighth year as Green Bay's head coach.