Rich CiminiSep 11, 2026, 06:00 AM ET
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Deep sighs. Long pauses. Cracked voices.

Twenty-five years later, it's still hard for some in the NFL community to talk about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks -- any community, for that matter. The pain and trauma from the tragedies in New York; Washington, D.C.; and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, will be felt for generations.

Like the rest of the country, the NFL was reeling in the aftermath. Players, coaches and officials were gripped by grief, fear and confusion -- raw emotions that gradually shifted over the course of 12 tumultuous days.

By the time they resumed games on Sept. 23 -- a hiatus that included intense, behind-the-scenes meetings on when it was appropriate to play football again -- the league had experienced a look-in-the-mirror moment that many believe set up a return that was galvanizing for the nation.

To commemorate the anniversary, ESPN is sharing the 9/11 experiences of more than a dozen people: Players, coaches, team officials, a league official and a fan who believes his love for the New York Giants saved his life.

Their memories are vivid. They remember the sense of pride born from the restorative healing process, and they remember the profound sadness.

Chris Mara, now a top Giants executive and a member of the Mara family that founded the franchise, began his interview with an apology.

"Please bear with me, this isn't going to be easy. I lost four close friends that day," he said, clearing his throat. "But we'll get through it."

A quarter-century later, the effects are still felt, but we examine how they got through the trying times -- along with the lasting impact.

Jump to a section:
'All hell broke loose'
'Some things I wish I had never seen'
'We're not going to play'
'There wasn't a dry eye'
'The best in people'

'All hell broke loose'

The NFL was waking up on a Tuesday (the day off for players) when, in the span of 51 minutes on a brilliantly sunny day, three hijacked planes struck the north and south towers of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. At 10:03 a.m., four minutes after the first of the two towers collapsed, United Flight 93 from Newark, New Jersey, crashed in a field near Shanksville as passengers fought a valiant battle against the hijackers.

The New York Jets, based on Long Island at the time, were only 20 miles from the Towers. The Giants, who lost the night before in Denver, arrived at Newark on a red-eye shortly before Flight 93 took off and about 90 minutes before the first tower was hit. Some in their traveling party exited the airport via the United terminal.

What follows is an oral history, with accounts from people who were there (titles from 2001).

Ernie Accorsi, Giants general manager: We didn't find out until later that the gate next to ours was the terrorist plane, the one that crashed in Pennsylvania. [Giants personnel] walked right by that plane boarding.

Michael Strahan, Giants player: It kind of messes with your mind because you realize at the time that we were leaving the airport, walking through the terminal, people were going to get on these flights that we all know did not end well.

Tiki Barber, Giants player: I lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan when I was playing. I remember getting home, my wife was at work, I was home by myself. You started to hear rumblings from people texting you or calling you. I didn't answer my phone because I wanted to go to sleep. I kept getting these phone calls, phone calls, phone calls, text messages.

Eventually I answered one and they said, "Turn on your TV, this is crazy. Are you OK?"

Herm Edwards, Jets coach: I can remember sitting in my office. It was a beautiful day. From my office, you could always see planes going to LaGuardia.

Around when 9/11 happened, I didn't see any planes. I was like, "That's strange. Why are there no planes in the air?" Usually, you see them. It didn't sound right. It didn't look right. I turned the television on, and when I turned the television on, I saw it. I'm like, "Are you kidding me?"

Vinny Testaverde, Jets player: A bunch of us were watching it unfold on TV in the trainers' room, and you could see guys getting nervous and talking about what the possibilities were.

Shortly after that, everyone took off and went home. I remember calling my wife on the way home, telling her to get the kids out of school. We were all nervous, on edge.

Strahan: I was at home, Montclair, New Jersey, sleeping. Phone rings, pick up the phone and someone says, "Look out the window." And from where I lived, I had a view of the entire Manhattan skyline. I looked out the window, and I saw smoke coming from the first tower.

Jason Garrett, Giants player: We lived on 79th Street and West End Avenue. ... I think I fell asleep and then I just started hearing these fire trucks going by our window. And it's like sirens and trucks and sirens and trucks. And I'm thinking to myself, "What the hell is going on?"

Joe Andruzzi, New England Patriots player: I was sitting in a dentist's chair and heard on the radio that a plane hit the towers. So not thinking anything of it, I got back in my car. By then, the second plane had hit and it was all commotion on the radio.

When I finally realized what the hell was really going on, my heart was in my throat. I just had a gut feeling that one, if not two or three of my brothers [members of the FDNY] were all a part of it.

Damien Woody, Patriots player: I was in shock at what I was watching, unfolding on television -- an attack on our country, on American soil. That's something I had never seen before. It was surreal, watching everything unfold in real time.

Accorsi: All hell broke loose. From our practice field [in East Rutherford, New Jersey], you could see the towers smoking.

Dave Szott, Washington player: I was home in Morristown [New Jersey]. Marty Schottenheimer was the coach and he let me have Monday and Tuesday off with my family. From the hill in my neighborhood, you could see the towers burning. We couldn't get a hold of my brother, Kevin, who was working in Building 5 [at the World Trade Center]. To complicate matters, my brother is visually impaired. He's legally blind. ... So now I have a visually impaired brother we can't get a hold of, possibly involved directly.

Mara: My daughter, Kate [an actress] was headed to L.A. from New York on an American Airlines flight that left basically when all the other planes that crashed took off. We went through many hours of trying to figure out where she was and was she being affected by this? Were there going to be any more planes that it was going to happen to? We had no idea. It was pretty hairy.

Barber: I didn't know what to do. I always kind of know what to do. I'm aware, I feel like I can see things, I understand things. I had no idea what to do and I felt lost.

Kevin Mawae, Jets player: There are people who can tell you exactly where they were when JFK was shot. I know exactly where I was when the Challenger blew up in '86. There are defining moments in people's lives that change the entire world. You remember those things with clarity that's [unbelievable]; 9/11 is the same way.

Garrett: The world was about to change.

'Some things I wish I had never seen'

More than 3,000 people were killed in the attacks. NFL teams returned to work the following day for practice even though there was uncertainty on whether the Week 2 games would be played. It was a time for reflection.

In the ensuing days, the Jets and Giants boarded buses and visited Ground Zero to deliver supplies and boost the morale of rescue workers. The Washington players went to Arlington National Cemetery for a memorial service. Players visited fire departments, police stations and hospitals.

Some waited anxiously to hear from loved ones. Everywhere there were chilling reminders of what had occurred.

Barber: A sinking feeling came to me when I realized that the Giants Stadium parking lot ... is a commuter lot. People park in the parking lot and they get on a bus [to the city]. The sinking feeling happened to me when I realized that some of those cars never left. The owners weren't coming back for them, and it was haunting. It was almost like the ghosts ... were sitting right next to us as we were trying to continue to get ready for the season. It was hard. It was emotionally challenging, and I don't think a lot of us were prepared for that.

Mawae: A large part of my town worked in the financial district. Those were my neighbors. You go to the train station a week later and there's still hundreds of cars parked at the station and the owners are never coming back.

Testaverde: It hit me hard, maybe harder than most, because New York is my hometown. I remember when I was a kid, my father actually worked on some of those buildings in Lower Manhattan. He was a cement mason, a foreman, and he worked the basements, the concrete garages. He was part of that, so there was a connection there.

Accorsi: A couple of days after the attacks, I got a voicemail at my office from a Giants fan who worked at Cantor Fitzgerald, which suffered tremendous losses (658 of 960 workers were killed when the plane hit the North tower). He said, "I want you to know that I was at the game [in Denver]. My love of the Giants saved my life. My kids have a father today because of my love for the Giants."

Tony Sichenzio, Giants fan: At the time, I was just relieved that I was getting home because the skies had been closed. Then it dawned on me, that I'm alive because I went to a Giants game. That's when I left the message for Ernie. It was pure emotion that I did it, that I made the call. That's it. That's why I did it.

Accorsi: I couldn't speak afterward. Thank god I didn't erase it. We played it for the team and nobody said a word.

Sichenzio: I worked on the 104th floor. I lost 47 of 51 in my group, including three sets of brothers on the floor.

Andruzzi: My second-oldest brother, Jimmy, was one of the very first responders, so he was there early in the morning. I spent the next eight hours or so trying to get information. It wasn't until nighttime when my father called me -- my parents were living in Staten Island -- and he just said that everybody was safe. I'm sure there were some tears in his eyes as he was talking.

I came to find out that Jimmy made it to the 25th floor until one of his colleagues had chest pains. That slowed them down enough. They made it down to the lobby and then the walls around them, he said they were just cracking around them.

Mara: [My daughter] got grounded in Kansas City. The phones wouldn't work to call each other for a while, so there's some anxiety. She ended up spending the night there.

Szott: Fortunately, my brother had a co-worker who was there the prior time, when they tried to bomb it [in 1993]. Right away, he said, "This isn't a plane, this is a terrorist attack. Let's get out of here." So he was able to grab my brother's arm -- I mean, my brother grabbed his arm -- and they ran to catch the last ferry off the island. It probably saved my brother's life. That was a very long day for the Szott family.

Testaverde: I had a friend call me, and he asked me to go down to Ground Zero. The police commissioner, I guess, requested if I could do that. I went down there on Saturday and walked around to visit the rescue workers.

I saw some things I wish I had never seen. It's hard to erase from my memory, just the destruction, the disaster, the dust, the debris, the metal beams that were twisted and bent. It was hard to believe.

Barber: We're down near the World Trade Center, and it felt like a movie set. It felt like it was fake. It felt like something that was artificially created to be dramatic.

And we see all these workers covered in dust and firefighters and first responders and people trying to save lives and dig through the rubble. They were like zombies just walking around rotely doing their job.

Strahan: I remember walking to a room and [the first responders] are lying on the floor, sitting, their equipment's around them and they're just trying to rest, and we're going in and we're introducing ourselves and we're trying to encourage them. ... I've never seen tired like that -- ever. That was exhaustion, not tired.

Garrett: I can remember them saying, 'We need you guys.' They appreciated us being there, but there was a sense of, 'We need you guys to help rally this thing.'

Szott: I'm driving down the [New Jersey] Turnpike, headed back to D.C. because I've got practice, and I see a bunch of lights heading in my direction, heading north. There's hardly anyone on the road. As I get closer, there are 50, 60, 70 ambulances, heading north to try to assist in what they thought was going to be a catastrophic -- you know, people hurt at the site. I'll never forget that, all those lights.

Joe Browne, NFL senior vice president of communications and government affairs: Everything flashed in front of us. [The league office] had two employees who had spouses down there who unfortunately were killed. I remember [commissioner Paul Tagliabue] going over to St. Patrick's Cathedral with a small group of us, including the two employees, to say a prayer.

'We're not going to play'

Amid the recovery and the healing, Tagliabue faced a monumental decision: To play or not to play?

There was intense pressure from both sides, including powerful stands by the Giants and Jets players. On Thursday, two days after the attacks, Tagliabue made the unprecedented decision to call off the games, rescheduling the Week 2 games to the end of the regular season and pushing the entire postseason back by a week.

Tagliabue, who died in 2025, heeded the remorse of his predecessor, the late Pete Rozelle, who once said his decision to play the games after President John F. Kennedy's assassination in 1963 was his biggest regret as commissioner.

Browne: Paul had that very much in his mind. But then we also had a split between the owners. We had the older owners, several of whom were military veterans, who said, "We're not going to let these SOBs change our lives. We have to continue, business as usual, and not be bullied by them and we should play the games." And then we had some younger owners who didn't feel that way.

Edwards: We called the league office and I was like, "What are we doing?" They were like, "We're going to decide this week if we play." I was like, you can't play a football game. There's no way we're going to play a football game.

Woody: There was a feeling that football was so miniscule in this whole moment, like why in the world do we want to be playing when something like this happened?

Accorsi: Jason Sehorn was one of [the Giants'] player reps. He came up to my office in the middle of the afternoon and said, "Ernie, this isn't a threat or bluster. We're not going to play. We don't care if they fine us, suspend us. Whatever they do, we're unified." I called the commissioner and told him that.

Testaverde: I decided I was going to go in early and meet with Herm Edwards and [GM] Terry Bradway and tell them: "Listen, here's how I'm feeling. I know we're playing a game against the Raiders. With what's going on ... I'm not going to make the trip. I don't think it's the right time to play a football game. Whether you fine me, cut me, bench me, whatever it is, I'm staying home. I don't believe it's time to play football."

Mawae: I remember Vinny stood up in front of the team and said, "I'm a New Yorker, I grew up here in Elmont, my dad helped build these two buildings that are now rubble. I just think it's crazy that we're even having a conversation on whether we're going to play this game."

Testaverde: I've always lived my life by trying to do the right thing. In my heart, I thought it was the right thing to do at that time, knowing my voice was probably a little bigger or louder than some of my other teammates. At that time, I had to step up and say what I felt.

Mawae: I wanted to make sure our whole team was unanimous about what we were going to do, so I suggested we take a secret ballot team vote on whether we play or not. Every guy got a piece of paper, wrote his vote on a piece of paper.

[Player rep] Rick Lyle and I counted the votes up and there was no question that we weren't going to play that game. We stuffed the ballots in an envelope, sealed the envelope and signed our names in case we needed proof for the league.

Browne: I spoke to Karl Rove [the senior adviser to President George W. Bush] because I was the government affairs guy. He didn't tell us exactly what the White House wanted us to do, but it was clear that he thought the right thing to do -- the administration, not just Karl -- but the administration thought, "Hey, we should go ahead and play. We have to get the country back on an even keel."

Mawae: We had a second conference call with all 31 NFLPA player reps. There was a bunch of chatter and cross talk on the phone and finally Phil Hansen, the team rep for the Buffalo Bills, raised his voice and basically said, "I want everybody to shut up. The only two people I want to hear from are Kevin Mawae and Mike Strahan, because they're the ones most affected by what happened."

Phil Hansen, Bills player: There were a lot of people on the call and it was kind of going sideways and we got off on tangents and stuff. I felt strongly about it. I said I don't think we should play, and this is that big of a deal. I wanted to hear what the teams closest to this, what their thoughts were, because they were living it.

Mawae: I said, "Guys, if the league makes us play, I want you to know the New York Jets have voted not to play and we will forfeit this game regardless of what the decision is by the commissioner and the league office. All I'm asking for is if we have to stand there, that you stand with us." It was that night that all 31 teams agreed that, no matter what, we were not going to play a game that weekend.

Accorsi: I remember the day the games were canceled. It was a feeling of numbness. [Announcer] Dick Stockton, he lived in Manhattan, and [NFL executive] Joel Bussert -- the three of us met and we just took a walk. We actually walked for several miles across the city. It was completely vacated, so quiet. ... It was a solemn, hard-to-explain feeling you had that day, it was hard to define it.

Browne: The local players at the Jets and Giants felt a lot stronger about it than many of the players around the country. That was a factor, but I don't necessarily think it was the factor. I've seen over the years many of the players speaking out, saying they were not going to play. Well, it's easy to say. Whether they would've followed through with it, I'm not sure. But the players' input through [NFLPA executive director] Gene Upshaw certainly was a factor. I do think we made the right decision, but it wasn't an easy decision.

Strahan: It was the appropriate decision.

we paid a visit to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum to honor and remember the tragic events of September 11, 2001 pic.twitter.com/4xNoqlZ9lO
— New York Jets (@nyjets) September 10, 2026

'There wasn't a dry eye'

Finally, it was time to play. And, oh, how the emotions poured out.

On Sept. 23, the Giants played the Kansas City Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium. The Jets made the short trip to Foxborough, Massachusetts, where they faced the Patriots, their archrivals. Both New York teams won.

The enduring image from the day was Andruzzi, a starting guard for the Patriots, running out of the tunnel and joining his three fire-fighting brothers at midfield for the coin toss.

It was a lump-in-throat moment on an unprecedented day in NFL history.

Edwards: I remember talking to Bill [Belichick] on the sideline -- we were just visiting in the warmup -- and we were both saying, "I don't know how they're going to play. I have no idea."

Testaverde: Near my locker, as you walk into the shower and bathroom area, there was a poster and it had headshots of rescue workers who had lost their lives at Ground Zero. I'm just looking, going through it, and I see an old high school teammate of mine -- Ronald Kloepfer. He was a year ahead of me [at Sewanhaka High School in Floral Park, New York]. He was a great teammate, a good friend to everybody in our school.

All of a sudden, you have to get your mind ready to play a football game. As my livelihood, it was always so important, but that day ... it wasn't as important. That entire game is a blur. (Kloepfer's son, Casey, 4 months old on Sept. 11, 2001, is now an NYPD officer, like his father was.)

Mawae: Before we went out, [our equipment manager] passed out NYPD, FDNY and Port Authority Police hats that we wore on the sideline in solidarity with all the first responders. It was emotional, man.

Woody: My most vivid memory was watching Joe Andruzzi running out on the field with the two American flags. Man, there was a lot of energy -- a lot of energy in that stadium at that moment. That, to me, that was the signature moment. A lot of emotion, too.

Andruzzi: There were two flags taped to the wall next to me as I ran out, and spur-of-the-moment, I grabbed them off the wall. It was awesome to have my brothers still in my life, and they were able to come out of it alive where others didn't have a chance to say goodbye to their loved ones or even give them another hug.

Edwards: There wasn't a dry eye [in the stadium] when they played the national anthem.

Curtis Martin, Jets player: I remember the national anthem in that game. This one tear fell out of my eye.

Mawae: There was more pride in that moment, returning to play that week, than I've ever seen in my life. I think back to the [Super Bowl XXV] when Whitney [Houston] sang the national anthem. It was that kind of a feeling.

Barber: We got to the stadium and the Kansas City fans, who were as raucous and just rough as they come in the NFL, gave us a standing ovation and it was so emotional.

Strahan: Usually when you play in Kansas City and they sing the national anthem, [instead of the words 'home of the brave'], they sing, 'home of the ... Chiefs!' But they were respectful. They didn't do that.

Barber: That was the first time after 9/11 that I heard the national anthem played, and I heard it differently. I heard it from a unifying [standpoint] -- this is our country, this is what we all represent.

Accorsi: It was such a relief to win that game. Oh my god, we didn't want to lose that game. I tell you what, the pressure in that game was unbelievable, just unbelievable.

Garrett: After that game, we went in the locker room and I think it was coach [Jim] Fassel's idea. He said, "Hey, everybody just get in here for this team picture." We all just kind of leaned back into this thing. It was the most organic team picture ever taken. We all had our NYPD hats, our FDNY hats on, and there was a sense of emotion and everybody together. It's still my favorite picture I've ever been a part of in football.

Edwards: We were for America that day. It was a moment where we celebrated our freedoms and the things America stands for. It was like, OK, we're back to some type of being normal again.

Accorsi: You felt so violated if you lived in New York. For us, it was a Pearl Harbor-like feeling because you were attacked in your homeland, in your city where you lived. We took it personally as far as our responsibility. I'm sure the Jets did, too.

'The best in people'

The first post-9/11 game in the New York area was Sept. 30, New Orleans Saints at the Giants, who honored the children of first responders who were killed. Strahan didn't find out until many years later that the little boy he put on his shoulders that day was Pete Davidson, the comedian-actor whose father, Scott, was a member of the FDNY.

Washington, too, honored victims and first responders that day at their home game against the Chiefs.

Twenty-five years later, the feelings remain strong.

Mara: It doesn't seem like it was that long ago to me. I sit here in my office, and I have a Flag of Honor on the wall ... [pauses and chokes up] ... and it's got basically all the names of my friends that died.

Sichenzio: One of my really good friends, Steve Genovese, he's buried not far from my house. I go there every year. I meet a couple of guys, and we go and we talk and remember. You just try to be around family and visit a few cemeteries. That's kind of my drill every year.

This year, I'm going to go out with [friends] and my son. We'll take a peek at the 9/11 Memorial. At the Memorial, there's a whole corner of all my guys at one of those reflecting ponds. We'll take a look and remember the names and the stories.

Andruzzi: Everybody has photographic memories, and I can close my eyes right now and remember when I drove into the city on that Friday to pick up my brother, standing on the FDR Drive and ... just seeing smoke -- it's just heart-wrenching. That smell was something I don't want to ever smell again.

Testaverde: I got to meet [the Andruzzi brothers] in 2018, when they opened the sports section of the 9/11 museum in Manhattan. They're a pretty cool family.

One of the good things coming out of this was getting to meet those guys and hearing their experiences and what they went through on 9/11.

Andruzzi: I look at my brothers, they're my heroes -- them and their colleagues are running into burning buildings and running into issues and problems when others are running out.

Garrett: In 2015, [as the Dallas Cowboys' coach], we took the entire team to the [World Trade Center site]. We went a day early [before facing the Giants] and just had an amazing, amazing night. I think everybody understood why it was so important and why the response was so important, and how that could be an inspiration for us. It was one of the most memorable nights I've had involved in football, and I'm very grateful to the [Jones family] for making all that happen, but I think it's something that our team really appreciated.

Mawae: There are very few things in this country that draw the nation together, but the NFL did that. The NFL did that in that moment, in that week, and then in the subsequent weeks when we came back and started playing again.

Woody: Even in something as horrific as that, you saw the best of us. You saw the best in humanity and people. It's unfortunate that these types of things have to happen in order to see the best in people, but that's what happened.

Testaverde: When I made that first trip to Ground Zero, I picked up a piece of granite or stone from the rubble. I brought it in, mentioned it to the team and put it in my locker, a reminder of what took place and to appreciate what we have.

Eventually, I broke it into three pieces and gave a piece to each of my kids. It's a symbol of what can happen and what people can accomplish when they come together, people stepping up to help others, strangers helping strangers. The original stone wasn't that big, probably as big as my hand, but it holds so much meaning. That will never change.

25 years after 9/11, Strahan, Testaverde, others relive the emotional memories

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