SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- For former San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Dwight Clark, there's something about ringing in the new year that brings good fortune.

On Sunday, Clark celebrated his 60th birthday. On Monday night, he was in Tampa to see Clemson, his alma mater, win the college football national championship in thrilling fashion. On Tuesday, he celebrated the 35th anniversary of "The Catch," the game-tying 6-yard touchdown he caught from Joe Montana in the 1982 NFC Championship Game that set up the game-winning extra point to send the Niners to the Super Bowl.

And as if all of that wasn't enough, the play call that ended with Clemson quarterback Deshaun Watson hitting wide receiver Hunter Renfrow for the game-winning 2-yard touchdown against Alabama on Monday looked awfully familiar. In the Eastern time zone, Renfrow scored his touchdown on Jan. 10, exactly 35 years after Clark made "The Catch."

Dwight Clark's catch beat the Cowboys and remains one of the iconic moments in NFL history. Rob Lindquist/Getty Images

The play that afforded Watson the chance to throw or run for the score and sprung Renfrow with the pick/rub play had a striking resemblance to the play in which Montana found Clark. That play, called simply "sprint right option," differed from the Clemson touchdown only in how it finished, but not in how it was designed.

In the Niners' version, Montana's first read was supposed to be receiver Freddie Solomon, who was supposed to shake loose via pick, just as Renfrow did. Earlier in that game, Solomon had scored on a similar play.

"There’s all kinds of versions of how we had practiced it, where we practiced it, when -- everybody remembers it a little bit different," Clark told the 49ers website in 2013. "The way I remember it is, we had practiced it during practice maybe once, and then Bill [Walsh] kept Joe and I after practice during training camp, and he said, "This is what we’re going to do; we’re going to try to pick the defender that’s covering Freddie, hit him, touchdown. If that doesn’t work, then keep rolling, you can run in if it's open. The third option would be to roll to the right and throw it high enough where it goes out of bounds or Dwight can jump up and catch it. But don't throw it low, don't throw an interception. We won't call this on fourth down. Give us another down to make a play."

But Solomon slipped the second time, which threw off the timing and forced Clark to run his route in the back of the end zone, faking left and then tiptoeing along the back right corner of the end zone.

Montana was flushed from the pocket, and as he faded backward and was hit, he lofted a high pass to Clark in hopes he could come down with it. Clark's leap and fingertip grab remains one of the most famous plays in NFL history for not only its degree of difficulty, but also for how clutch it was in a big moment.

It also set in motion a series of events that established the Niners as one of the NFL's dominant franchises for the better part of the two decades that followed.

"What I love about it the most is that it's connected me with 49ers fans for the rest of time," Clark said in 2013. "I didn't realize at the time that people would keep talking about it. But they not only talk about it, they pass it down through the generations. I'll be at an autograph thing, there'll be a 10-year old kid saying, "You're The Catch."

On Monday night, after watching Renfrow haul in the national-title-winning catch while playing the role of Solomon, Clark told CSN Bay Area that the player in his position never had a chance -- much like Solomon didn't -- in 1982 because the player running his route "got pushed to the ground."

Although it didn't play out exactly how "The Catch" did, it was just another sweet victory in early January for Clark.