LAKE FOREST, Ill. – A vintage performance by Walter Payton in a 1985 victory over the Green Bay Packers was featured Monday night on NFL Network’s NFL Classic Games series. 

The Hall of Fame running back rushed for 192 yards on 28 carries, including a 27-yard TD with 10:31 left in the fourth quarter that lifted the Bears to a 16-10 win at Lambeau Field.

Walter Payton rushed for 192 yards and 1 TD in a 16-10 win at Green Bay Nov. 3, 1985.

“I thought Payton’s exhibition was maybe as good as I’ve ever seen a guy with a football under his arm play,” coach Mike Ditka said after the Bears improved to 9-0 en route to Super Bowl XX.

Payton’s performance came in a game that featured more cheap shots than a typical professional wrestling match. An ongoing feud between Ditka and Packers coach Forrest Gregg ratcheted up the intensity level of an already fierce rivalry. There were six personal fouls in the first half, four by Green Bay.

Packers safety Ken Stills drilled quarterback Jim McMahon after a Payton fumble and later hit fullback Matt Suhey—who was standing near a pile of players—several seconds after the whistle.

“I don’t mind that,” Gregg said. “He took a crack at somebody. That’s aggressive football.”

The worse infraction of all came early in the game when safety Mark Lee rode Payton out of bounds and shoved him over the Bears bench, drawing an immediate ejection.

“Those things don’t intimidate me,” Payton said after the game. “They just make me reach down deeper. Ejection is pretty strong, but I guess the officials thought it was a late hit. I was just hanging onto his jersey at the end, so I wouldn’t go completely off balance. It didn’t bother me.”

Payton carried the Bears offense, which struggled mightily though the air. Quarterback Jim McMahon completed just 9 of 20 passes for 91 yards.

“Jim was a little off today and we had to revert to our running attack,” wide receiver Dennis McKinnon said after the game. “We went back to the Bears of old and it worked like a charm.”

McMahon provided one memorable highlight when he tossed a four-yard touchdown pass to William “Refrigerator” Perry to give the Bears a 7-3 lead late in the first half. Perry went in motion, turned up field and was wide open in the end zone following a play-action fake.

“They saw him coming and got out of the way,” Ditka said.

“When I went in motion, I couldn’t be all intense and quick getting out there,” Perry said. “I just took my time, ran the right speed, then broke it up and got in the flat. The only thing I thought was ‘Just catch it.’”

“The only thing that upset me is he said he would do a 360-degree dunk over the goal post,” said center Jay Hilgenberg.

The Packers took a 10-7 lead on Jim Zorn’s 55-yard touchdown pass to running back Jesse Clark late in the third quarter. The Bears then closed the gap to 10-9 when Steve McMichael sacked Zorn in the end zone for a safety.

Following the free kick, Payton capped a three-play, 49-yard drive with the winning touchdown, bouncing off Packers linebacker Brian Noble at the Green Bay 20 and gliding into the end zone.

“I wasn’t the star of this show,” Payton told reporters after the game. “This team is the star. Put the spotlight on the Chicago Bears. This was as intense a game as we’ve ever had against them, in a way. I couldn’t say what their motivation was today, but ours was that we’re a pretty good football team who’s not supposed to lose to them.”

It was a perfect ending to a day that began with the Bears arriving at Lambeau Field to find a bag of fertilizer in their locker room with a signed note from a Wisconsin radio station that read: “Here’s what you guys are full of.”

According to defensive tackle Dan Hampton, it was a prank that “ticked off Ditka.”

“They played about as hard as I was excited,” Ditka said after the game.

NFL Classic Games features the complete network broadcasts of legendary NFL games. The Bears-Packers contest was televised on NFL Network Monday night at 7 p.m. and 11:30 p.m. (CT).