Wow.
That was the only appropriate utterance in light of the Giants’ stunning 17-14 victory over the previously perfect Patriots in Super Bowl XLII last Sunday. And now that a few days have passed, allowing for a little perspective on the game, there’s still only one thing left to say.
Wow.
Shock and unbridled joy do eventually pass, but there’s a chance that this one will linger just a little bit longer than your ordinary upset. Except in New York, the Patriots came into the game as the main storyline. They had won 18 consecutive games and were poised to become only the second team in NFL history to run the table (the 1972 Dolphins went 17-0). They had scored 589 points during the season, led by Tom Brady’s record-setting 50 TD passes and Randy Moss’ record-setting 23 TD catches. The fewest points they had scored in a game all year was 20. They had the most prolific offensive season in NFL history. The defense – an aging group of crafty veterans – was certainly the Pats’ weakness, but the offense more than compensated for it.
And so the Giants’ victory is legendary as much for how it happened as for the result. Had the Giants’ simply outscored the Patriots, it wouldn’t have been nearly as impressive as holding them to 14 points while sacking Tom Brady 5 times and knocking him down 19 others. The Giants did not win by attacking the Patriots’ soft underbelly. They went right after New England’s immortal assemblage of offensive weapons and made them look less than ordinary. There are three Pro Bowlers on New England’s vaunted offensive line. Didn’t look like it Sunday night.
A closer look at the Patriots’ defense reveals that even if they had gone 19-0, they could not be considered the best team of all time. They were certainly the most spectacular. But great defense is simply more reliable and less likely to go into a slump. Although the Patriots mostly avoided slumps this season, a look at their point totals in their final six games shows them averaging just over 25 points a game, more than 13 points lower than the 38-plus they averaged over the first 13 games. That’s why I’ll always take the ’86 Bears and that ferocious defensive unit over the Pats as an all-time team.
But back to the Giants. In addition to the fact that the defense was so surprisingly dominant last week – the Giants played well defensively during the season, but it wasn’t exactly an invincible unit – the G-Men also made clutch play after clutch play in the most critical moments. And some of those plays were sprinkled with a hint of the magical. Has there ever been a more unlikely play in NFL history than the less-than-mobile Eli Manning escaping from a near-certain sack to wing a pass down the field to the little-used David Tyree, who then caught the ball against his helmet? In order to pull off an upset of this magnitude, there needs to be at least a little bit of the inexplicable. Brady’s methodical drive to put the Pats ahead 14-10 with 2:42 remaining is not the stuff of legends. Tyree’s catch is one of those forever-moments emblazoned in the heads and hearts of every sports fan who witnessed it go down.
And so, because of the way they did it, the Giants’ win becomes as much of a story as the Patriots’ loss. Some low-scoring games are boring and sloppy; Super Bowl XLII was crackling with hard-hitting intensity. It wasn’t offensive ineptitude; it was defensive superiority. The Pats’ 7-3 lead at halftime held up until the opening moments of the fourth quarter and as a result, every passing moment became filled with a palpable tension that made Manning’s drive at the end of regulation even more ecstatic. Throw in the fact that the win was the Giants’ 11th straight away from home (and that they started the season 0-2) and what you have isn’t an all-time great team, but certainly an indelible one.
I heard someone say last week that if this game were played 10 times, the Pats would win eight. And the Giants’ victory is certainly proof that any team can lose at any time. But one loss doesn’t invalidate the Patriots’ as a great team. It just makes them an incomplete one. Perhaps their luck just ran out. Toward the end of the season, the Patriots won a few games that made it seem like 19-0 was their destiny. (How did they pull out that Ravens game in Week 13?) But the way the Giants won their three playoff games – particularly on the road against the Cowboys and Packers – made them a very live underdog. In retrospect, they were the most difficult team the Patriots could have faced in their quest for perfection. Only the kind of momentum the Giants carried into the Super Bowl could have derailed the Patriots train.
Ultimately, the Giants’ victory is a microcosm of both the fickle and fascinating aspects of sports. Six weeks ago, Eli was a bust, Tom Coughlin was a mediocre, out-of-touch head coach and the Giants were a team that couldn’t beat anybody in the upper-echelon of the league. Four measly wins (and the scintillating Week 17 regular season loss to the Pats) changed all those perceptions. It must be simultaneously frustrating and refreshing for professional athletes to know they are always a few plays away from completely changing their reputations.
Even though sports is usually a “what have you done for me lately” kind of profession, there are some wins that last forever. Ironically, it is now Tom Brady and Bill Belichick’s legacies that are slightly tainted, fairly or not. Because of the way it went down, Eli will never pay for another meal in New York City as long as he lives. That’s just the way it is. For completely different reasons, the stories of the Giants and Patriots are what compel us to keep watching sports. Super Bowl XLII is a game that will be recounted and relived in the minds of fans for as long as there is football. That’s good news for New York and bad news for Boston. It was about time anyway. Between the Red Sox, the Celtics and the Patriots, those New Englanders were starting to get a little smug.
Captain Eli saves the day. Now let’s see what the Yankees can do to continue the New York uprising.