You're misreading the Samsung site.
Overheating is the result of the failure, not the cause. Your own experience proves that. You can't simply cool the phone back down and the problem goes away. Once the failure happens that's it. It can't be stopped.
You just experienced, well, something else. But it wasn't the issue that caused this recall.
Well, again, I believe you are stating an opinion, especially where you say, "Once the failure happens that's it. It can't be stopped." and that, "You just experienced, well, something else."... Further, I am reading the website exactly as it's written.
But I do agree you're at least partially correct... General overheating is a result of the plates in the battery being under too much pressure to begin with, which is what the manufacturing defect has been reported to be. It seems reasonable therefore, to conclude that continued overheating will very likely result in one of the short-circuit failure scenarios that causes meltdown/fire/exploding kittens!
I absolutely believe that Heat is definitely not your friend, here...
So for you to say that no amount of cooling can prevent an explosion is, IMO, not entirely accurate. (BTW, I'm not a battery expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I recently stayed at a Holiday Inn... and I do have a degree in Electronics Engineering Technology, so I'm not a complete dummy, either. Well, at least most of the time LOL, because my phone is still on!)
There are other possibilities, (some where heat is a contributing factor, some not) and from what I've read, (you can Google to your heart's content here) they all stem from the battery plates being under too much pressure from this manufacturing defect - there will likely be more when this is all over, but some possible scenarios for failure from this defect include:
1.) When lithium ion batteries are continually trickle charged, the lithium ions can start to cover the surface of the negative contact in a coating of lithium metal through a process called "plating." And in extreme conditions, that lithium metal can form tiny spikes (called "dendrites") that can poke right through the separator, creating -- you guessed it -- a short circuit. (this one would not be heat-related)
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
2.) ...perhaps Samsung simply pressed so hard that the positive and negative terminals poked right through the separator and managed to touch... (not heat-related, either)
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
3.) ...Or perhaps it's the sponge-like separator itself that got squished. Normally, says Sadoway, the separator allows the liquid electrolyte to pass through pores connecting the negative and positive sides of the battery, even as it keeps the two terminals separate. "If they press really hard, they constrict the pores, the resistance goes up and you generate more heat," says the professor. (heat-related)
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
4.) What if only part of the battery was squished improperly, so that the phone couldn't tell when it was 100 percent charged, and kept on charging the cell? (heat-related due to overcharging)
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
So, I'm going to say that it is highly likely that I did stop, by cooling, a potential "failure in progress" through nothing more than just plain dumb luck (or, as I prefer to believe, the intervention of YHVH!). Yes, cooling did not fix the manufacturing defect that is still there, (the battery plates under too much pressure) but it hasn't short-circuited and failed yet, just like the other 99.99% of the 1 million GN7 users in the USA. So, in all likelihood, I will make it until next week until my new GN7 arrives.
I would still take these odds in Vegas any time!
Thanks for your time. I hope that some of the detail is helpful, and I look forward to the day (like many of you, I would imagine) where this will be a long-forgotten topic...