It's certainly impossible to fit 97 mins on two reels
16" reels can hold 2000 feet of 16mm film (super 16 and Type W) film which is 55.32 minutes so two reels would cover 110 minutes (multiply 0.02766 x total feet = run time)
The thing is, I think in 1978 the TV stations got either/or 2" quad tape (a reel also) and some stations MAY HAVE gotten 16mm - BASED on what the said studio used for broadcast.
SO, it is possible that there are a few 16mm reel tapes out there, but I think the studio owned them so they had to be returned upon request.