If you were looking for a couple of good football games yesterday, you found them in the AFC and NFC championships. Watching rookie Mark Sanchez of the Jets exhibit the poise of a wily veteran and almost upset the vaunted Indianapolis Colts had me glued to the tube. Had you told me that a kid, with a mustache that looks like it was painted on using mascara, would open the game with an 83 yard touchdown strike against one of the best teams in the NFL I would have asked you to share whatever it was you took. Even so, the Jets are a young team. Look for them to get even better as time goes on.
Later watching Favre and company run the favored New Orleans Saints into overtime and almost subject the nation to two more weeks of the Mississippi Drama Queen caused me to put a serious dent in the local Budweiser inventory. Actually, it isn’t Favre so much as the hyperventilating podcasters who foist themselves onto my my favorite sports’ shows that scared me. I had legitimate fears that they would be in the Minnesota locker room wearing knee pads. Nevertheless, when all was said and done, I figured two weeks of listening to “Who Dat” was an acceptable price to pay.
MIKE MULLIGAN over at the Sun Times takes a look at the Indy victory yesterday.
Manning talked about ‘’grinding’’ for the Jets so much, he interrupted himself at one point to laugh about his overuse of the word.
But with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line against a team the Colts effectively allowed in the playoffs by benching players (including Manning) instead of pursuing a perfect season, the quarterback clearly was determined not to let the organization be embarrassed. He said he spent endless hours breaking down film of Rex Ryan’s defenses before eventually finding a tape of a Baltimore-Indy game from the 2005 season when Ryan was the defensive coordinator with the Ravens.
Whatever Manning saw, he had all the answers for a Jets team that built a 17-6 lead before the Colts ran off 24 unanswered points. Indy wound up with 461 total yards against a Jets defense that finished the regular season ranked No. 1 overall.
‘’If you can’t disrupt Peyton Manning’s rhythm, he’ll kill you,’’ said Ryan, the son of former Bears defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan. ‘’We didn’t disrupt him enough. We tried everything. We tried man, two-man, tried zone, you name it. You gotta give him credit. He’s a heck of a quarterback.’’
The beginning of the end for the Jets came when Manning directed a spectacular four-play drive to a touchdown with less than a minute left in the first half. Manning threw a strike to rookie Austin Collie for a 46-yard gain to set up a 16-yard TD pass to Collie on the next play. The 46-yarder, Manning said, was the play that gave the Colts the rhythm Ryan talked about.
Then, on the opening possession of the second half, the Jets took the kickoff and couldn’t resist trying a 52-yard field goal that wound up giving Manning a short field. Ryan likely figured he had to create some points, but the Colts got the ball at the 43 and drove downfield in eight plays, capping it with a four-yard TD to Pierre Garcon.
Manning’s passer rating was 123.6 after he went 26-for-39 for 377 yards with three TDs. Most impressive was that the two 100-yard receivers he found were not named Reggie Wayne or Dallas Clark.
The stars instead were Garcon, a second-year pro who was a seventh-round pick out of Mount Union College, and Collie, a fourth-round selection last April from BYU. Garcon had 11 catches for 151 yards; Collie caught seven for 123, and both caught a touchdown pass.
Garcon, a first-generation American whose parents were born in Haiti, waved a flag in honor of that earthquake-shattered country. Unfortunately, he used it a few times to wipe sweat off his brow and upper lip, but his heart was in the right place.
‘’I was trying to do it for the country,’’ Garcon said of Haiti.
I will admit that I have no clue how waving the Haitian flag helps that torn country, but I couldn’t see any way that it hurt either. I will also admit that I am clueless as to why the Jets tried that long field goal early in the third quarter. But I won’t second guess too much. The Jets came out and were aggressive all game. The fact that they went as far as they did with such a young team, a rookie QB and a rookie coach says a lot about where that franchise is headed. I do know that the Colts’ eventual victory was never in much doubt, but I was pleased to see them have to work so hard for it.
Over in the NFC Championship game, the Vikings and the Saints each did all they could to lose the game and all they could to win it. It might not have been the best played game I have seen, but it was sure as hell exciting. SAM FARMER at the Tribune fills us in.
The victory is especially meaningful to a city, state and region ravaged by Hurricane Katrina just a few years ago. The franchise has provided a glimmer of hope for untold thousands in the Gulf Coast region.
The Vikings had a great chance to win. With the score tied at 28, a battered and hobbled Favre drove his team to the outer fringes of field-goal range in the waning moments of regulation.
But with 19 seconds to play, he threw an across-the-body pass for Sidney Rice over the middle of the field that was intercepted by cornerback Tracy Porter. It was the fifth turnover for the Vikings, who had two passes picked off and lost three of six fumbles.
The Saints didn’t have enough time to move into scoring range in regulation, but they won the overtime coin flip and never surrendered the ball. It was the third NFC title game to go into overtime, coming two years after the Giants beat Favre’s Packers at Lambeau Field.
In the extra period, Brees directed a 10-play, 39-yard drive that was aided by two Vikings penalties — and kept alive by a 2-yard plunge by Pierre Thomas on fourth-and-1 at the Minnesota 43.
The packed house erupted when Hartley boomed his kick through the uprights with 10 minutes, 19 seconds on the clock, finally punctuating decades of frustration and heartache.
The Saints have shed the dubious distinction of being among the five NFL teams that never have made it to a Super Bowl. That group now consists of the Browns, Texans, Lions and Jaguars.
Outside the New Orleans locker room after the game was Pat Swilling, a longtime star defensive end for the Saints who played on some teams that were good but just not good enough.
“I saw (former linebacker) Rickey Jackson outside, and he had tears in his eyes — and I have them in mine,” Swilling said. “This is what we fought for.
“All those great years that we had and we never got over the hump. To see these guys get over it is just wonderful, man.”
Yes it is. I am old enough to remember the Archie Manning years and clearly recollect the poor fans of New Orleans cheering a great quarterback on a lousy team. They have deserved better for a long time and now they have it.
So, now we get the season’s two best quarterbacks facing off in a Superbowl that stands a chance of living up to its hype. I guess, at the end of the day, that is the only real surprise. It has been a while since we have had two evenly matched teams heading into the big game.
I guess we can also be surprised when we find out what the local mayors are going to wager. After all, aside from grease and corn, there are no native foods in Indianapolis.