Dan Bunz (born October 7, 1955) is a former

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

linebacker Linebacker (LB) is a playing position in gridiron football. Linebackers are members of the defensive team, and line up three to five yards behind the line of scrimmage and the defensive linemen. They are the "middle ground" of defenders, p ...

who played for the

San Francisco 49ers The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National ...

and

Detroit Lions The Detroit Lions are a professional American football team based in Detroit. The Lions compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) North Division. The team play their home games at Ford ...

of the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL) in an eight-year career that lasted from 1978 to 1985. Bunz played at

Oakmont High School Oakmont High School is located at 1710 Cirby Way, in Roseville, California, United States. The school is surrounded by the communities of Citrus Heights, Rocklin, Granite Bay, and Antelope. It is one of five comprehensive high schools in the Ro ...

, the

University of California, Riverside The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public land-grant research university in Riverside, California. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The main campus sits on in a suburban distr ...

, and

California State University, Long Beach California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) is a public research university in Long Beach, California. The 322-acre campus is the second largest of the 23-school California State University system (CSU) and one of the largest universities i ...

before being drafted in the first round of the

1978 NFL Draft The 1978 NFL draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held May 2–3, 1978, at the Roosevelt Hote ...

by the 49ers. He had a small role in the 1979 movie ''

North Dallas Forty ''North Dallas Forty'' is a 1979 American sports film starring Nick Nolte, Mac Davis, and G. D. Spradlin set in the decadent world of American professional football in the late 1970s. It was directed by Ted Kotcheff and based on the best-selling ...

''. He has been teaching physical education at Sutter Middle School, in Sacramento, California for over 22 years.

The Stop

Super Bowl XVI Super Bowl XVI was an American football game between the National Football Conference (NFC) champion San Francisco 49ers and the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Cincinnati Bengals to decide the National Football League (NFL) champ ...

(January 24, 1982), Bunz made one of the most famous tackles in NFL history. On a critical 3rd-and-Goal from the 1-yard line,

Cincinnati Bengals The Cincinnati Bengals are a professional American football team based in Cincinnati. The Bengals compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) AFC North, North division. The c ...

quarterback Ken Anderson passed to Charles Alexander in the right flat, but Bunz came up fast, grabbed Alexander around the waist, and hurled him backward before he could break the plane of the goal line. Had Bunz tackled Alexander low, his momentum certainly would have carried him into the end zone. Known as "The Stop", the play was followed by another stop on 4th down, slowing Cincinnati's comeback and ultimately propelling the 49ers to their first Super Bowl title.

Personal life

Bunz is a lifelong

Placer County Placer County ( ; Spanish for "sand deposit"), officially the County of Placer, is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 404,739. The county seat is Auburn. Placer County is included in the Great ...

resident who grew up in Roseville with his older siblings Ben and Dennis. He retired from the

at age 30 after a contract dispute, and became a teacher at Sutter Middle School in Sacramento. He and his wife own a farm on the Placer County Wine Trail. In 1984 Bunz opened Bunz & Company restaurant and sports bar in his hometown of Roseville, California. He sold the restaurant in 1999, and it closed in the summer of 2012. On January 19, 2013, Bunz and some other entrepreneurs opened 2H - 2nd Half at Bunz & Company in the same location as the original Bunz and Company. He appeared in an episode of HGTV's ''Yard Crashers'' when his daughters' back yard got a makeover. Hillside Terrace (2012)

References

External links

Bywater Hollow Lavender
1955 births Living people American football linebackers Long Beach State 49ers football players UC Riverside Highlanders football players Detroit Lions players San Francisco 49ers players Sportspeople from Roseville, California Oakmont High School alumni Players of American football from California {{linebacker-1950s-stub