Apparently, a “walk off safety” (in American football) means when the defense gets a safety (as was the case in this game in overtime), the game is over and the teams “walk off” the field. Who knew?
Updated: 11/1/2013
Yes, there’s more to this story. It isn’t the first walk off safety, but they don’t happen often. In fact, there have been only three. This one, November 2004 Bears vs Titans and November 1989 Vikings vs Rams.
I usually pride myself in finding answers to questions I don’t know the answers to by Googling. Google failed me on Halloween. Since I was watching the game delayed on the DVR, the only results I got were roughly twenty stories about the game with the keywords “walk off safety”, but no one really explaining what it meant. Maybe I was just supposed to know. I mean it seemed logical that walk off safety = game ending safety, but we all like proof and not finding it quickly became frustrating. The fact that the media was making such a big deal about it without explaining it added to the frustration. I actually heard someone say “it wasn’t just a safety, but a walk off safety. Goodnight folks. <fade to commercial>” WTF!
Of course, I’ve learned so much about walk offs in many sports now so there’s a plus side to all of this.