NEW YORK — Twenty-five years later, the moment still seems surreal to the Mets who witnessed it. It was Sept. 21, 2001 — 10 days after the deadliest act of terrorism in United States history — and heartbreak, anger and fear continued to engulf the country.

Debates had raged over whether it was too soon to resume MLB games, particularly in New York, where the Mets’ Shea Stadium sat merely 12 miles away from the site of the horrific World Trade Center attacks.

But in a demonstration of the country’s fortitude, the Mets faced their archrival Atlanta Braves in Queens that night for the first sporting event in the city after the tragedy. And with a dramatic swing even Hollywood couldn’t have scripted, Mets star Mike Piazza drilled a game-winning home run that brought some 41,000 fans to their feet, offering a needed moment of relief amid all of the suffering.

“What we did that day,” former Mets reliever John Franco recalled to the New York Daily News this month, “is we put a small Band-Aid on a big wound for a couple of hours.”

As New York marks the 25th anniversary of 9/11, the Mets’ profound role in helping New York heal is now well-established.

But back then, agonizing uncertainty hung over the immediate aftermath of the attacks that killed 2,977 people at the World Trade Center, The Pentagon and in Somerset County, Penn., where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed after a revolt against the plane hijackers.

MLB suspended play for six days, but to the players who called New York home, baseball felt insignificant as their community reeled. As first responders searched for survivors in the rubble of the collapsed Twin Towers, Shea Stadium functioned as a staging area to collect incoming supplies and as a temporary shelter where rescuers could sleep in between shifts.

Mets players and manager Bobby Valentine visited relief workers at Ground Zero at the behest of NYPD and FDNY officials who believed they could help raise spirits.

“There was a sense of trepidation from all of us as players,” former first baseman Todd Zeile told The News. “As to, ‘What are we doing here? Why would we sort of invade their space when they’re working 24-hour shifts to try to see if they can find anybody alive, and pulling out their brethren and so on?’

“That flipped really quickly when we saw the reaction in the faces of some of the guys. You could see they just needed a little bit of a break. … [They wanted] to talk about baseball, relive the 2000 World Series a little bit, mention their favorite baseball story.”

The Mets resumed play on Sept. 17 in Pittsburgh, with Valentine taking a commercial flight there in order to show faith in post-9/11 plane safety. But while the Mets swept the Pirates, their focus remained on New York.

“I had players coming into my office with tears in their eyes, wanting to be with their family, and I got that,” Valentine told The News. “I was trying to take a leadership role the best that I could, but how do you lead when you have no game plan?

“Usually leaders are properly prepared, and I don’t think any of us were even remotely prepared for anything we were doing. I was just trying to give, right? I think that’s what the job of a manager and a coach is anyway: Find out what the need is, and then fulfill the need.”

Some players questioned the decision to return to play in New York less than two weeks after the attacks.

But, as Franco and Zeile recalled, President Bush and Mayor Giuliani stressed the importance of restoring normalcy and making a statement about America’s resolve.

So the Mets hosted the Braves on a Friday night. The players now acknowledge nothing about that night felt normal at the start.

“Life had changed real fast, because after the tragedy, when you pulled up to the ballpark, there were tons of police and FBI and bomb-sniffing dogs,” Franco said.

Mets players began wearing NYPD and FDNY hats that day to honor the first responders, an acknowledgement that stemmed from Zeile trading caps with a police officer during a visit to Ground Zero. Marc Anthony sang the national anthem and Diana Ross performed “God Bless America” before first pitch.

“It was against our nemesis, the great, mighty Atlanta Braves organization — we had to go through Atlanta every year for 14 years,” former left-hander Al Leiter told The News. “They were in town. They didn’t like us, we didn’t like them. But we hugged.”

Franco remembers a “quiet” crowd in the early innings of what began as a ho-hum game.

It wasn’t until the seventh-inning stretch, when Liza Minelli unleashed a rousing rendition of “New York, New York,” that the energy began to turn.

That helped set the stage for the Mets’ momentous comeback.

Trailing 2-1 in the bottom of the eighth, Piazza stepped to the plate with one out and a runner on first base. On the mound for Atlanta was right-hander Steve Karsay, who grew up in Queens, just a few miles away from the stadium.

Piazza rose to the occasion, crushing a no-doubt two-run home run to straight-away center field, well beyond the 410-foot marker. That gave the Mets a 3-2 lead, which proved to be the final score.

The fans — some of them waving American flags, others moved to tears — roared and reveled in a celebration akin to a World Series victory.

“Shea Stadium was on rails, and people would jump up and down, and you could feel that pulse at third base,” said former third baseman Robin Ventura, who was on deck for Piazza’s home run.

“After that inning, you go out there and people are just cheering and pouring out all of this pent-up emotion. You could feel it in your feet at third base. … I was thinking, ‘This is good for these people to just let loose. It’s OK to cheer. It’s OK to have a smile.’ Because you didn’t really know before that when you could joke around or laugh or do anything.”

The team’s community support didn’t stop there, with the efforts spearheaded by longtime Mets media relations director Jay Horwitz. The Mets worked with Tuesday’s Children — a nonprofit founded to help families affected by 9/11 — by hosting kids at games and holiday parties. For the remainder of the season, they welcomed first responders and grieving families to games.

“You’re meeting families that have lost somebody … every day at batting practice, not that you really have the words to say [anything]. You’re just thankful that they’re there and that they want to come and do something,” Ventura said.

“That part was pretty tough. I don’t know what it is, but if I hear bagpipes, I can’t really keep my composure, even to this day.”

The Mets continued to wear hats featuring the logos of different first-response organizations, even after MLB warned them that it went against uniform protocol. Famously, Zeile said at the time that if league officials didn’t want the Mets wearing those hats, they would have to “rip them off our heads.”

“It was an honor, actually, because I can’t tell you the amount of families, from that point on until the end of the season, that would come out to Shea. We’d bring people onto the field, and they were just so grateful for us to wear these hats,” Leiter said.

“It was such a small token of appreciation, for us to appreciate what all of these families were going through, and they appreciated us wearing them. So it was a no-brainer.”

Those efforts continue. Every 9/11 anniversary, Mets alumni visit local fire stations, including this year, when Zeile, Franco, Leiter, Ventura and David Wright met firefighters at the Ladder 25/Division 3/Collapse Rescue 1 firehouse in Manhattan on Tuesday.

Zeile executed-produced a documentary about baseball’s role after 9/11 titled “When America Took the Field,” which was set to re-air on MLB Network throughout the weekend after premiering Thursday night on the network and at a Citi Field screening.

The Mets are then set to face the Yankees in the Bronx over the weekend for a three-game series to commemorate the 25th anniversary.

All of that helps to remind how the Mets provided some joy during a time of extreme sorrow.

“[The world] was swirling, and you had to fake it,” Valentine said. “And I think that’s what everyone was doing, because they didn’t know what to do until Mike hit the home run. And then, they knew what to do.”

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