It had to happen at some point....

As I sit here writing this blog, I still can't believe what transpired last night. I watched it with my own eyes, yet for the first time in my life, I doubt what I saw. New York Giants-17 New England Patriots-14. The New York Giants, who had lost 6 games this season, beat the New England Patriots, who, coming into this game, hadn't lost. Period. But this was the Superbowl, the epitome of championships, so there is never a gurantee. I had the Patriots winning 35-17, because I didn't foresee Tom Brady's offensive line absolutely fall apart, nor did I see Eli Manning having the game of his life. I guess I was wrong. I will dole out credit where credit is due, no matter how hard it is. Congratulations Giants, you played a heck of a game, and you deserve the Lombardi trophy. With that being said, I'm going to go over a few points of the game that either a) baffled me or b) amazed me.

1) The Patriots O-Line: What surprises me here is that the guys up front (Matt Light, Logan Mankins, and Dan Koppen) had been absolutely lights out all season, giving Brady plenty of time to drop back, step forward, and get the pass off. Yet we get to the Superbowl, and they couldn't block anything. Brady got sacked 5 times and didn't have time to look downfield very often. With that being said....

2) Tom Brady: I don't even know what to say about him. Brady, who's statistics ( 29/48 266 yards 1 TD) show he played a decent game, actually had an absolute atrocity of a game. The aspect of his game that got to me the most was his inability to get the ball to Randy Moss. Moss was in position the whole game, running his routes and waiting for Brady to throw. Yet when Brady threw the ball in Randy's direction downfield, it was nowhere near Moss. Overthrown, underthrown, too far right, too far left; it was crazy how Brady couldn't find Moss for a big play. Moss was constantly open, blowing by the Giants secondary, but Randy could never capitalize because of Brady.

3) Wes Welker: Welker is a class act and without a doubt deserves everything he got this year. It's too bad he couldn't come away with a ring, but he had a great year nonetheless. Welker got open all night in Arizona, and he put on a show. It seems like every catch Welker makes is for a first down. Welker caught 11 passes for 103 yards, and all of those yards were important. If the Patriots had come away with a victory, Welker would have been my choice for MVP.

4) Eli Manning: I can personally say I will no longer refer to Eli as "Peytons little brother." Eli lit up the field last night and deserved to walk away with that MVP trophy. Manning (19/34 255 yards and 2 TD) looked brilliant on his way to winning his first world championship. With his brother Peyton there to watch him, he definitely showed why someday there could be a Manning v. Manning Superbowl.

5) The Giants Defense: Keeping my dignity intact, I will now admit that the Giants defense is for real. Don't get me wrong, after riding them my whole fantasy season I knew there was something right with them, but I really thought the Patriots would find a way to get around them. That wasn't the case. The front seven of the Giants pressured Brady all night and rattled him around until he couldn't even concentrate. For this Giant defense to come to Arizona, on the biggest stage they will ever be on, and hold the best offense to ever play football to 14 points is pretty amazing in my book.

6) Tiki Barber: The fact that the Giants won this game the year after Tiki retired is one of the few bright spots I found in this victory.

Going into this game, I had no doubt in my mind that the Giants could pull this victory from the Patriots. But just because I knew they could does not mean I saw this coming. Even when the Patriots got the ball back with 30 seconds left, I thought they were going to march downfield and kick a field goal to tie the game. As much as I would have loved to see history being made with the Patriots going undefeated, I guess it's not the end of the world. Playing a whole season without losing a single game is definitely a hard thing to do, and I give credit to the 1972 Miami Dolphins for remaining the only undefeated team in NFL history. And I give credit to the Giants for pulling out this improbable win when not many thought it would happen. I just still can't believe that the team that just won the Superbowl was beaten by my Vikings 41-17 just a mere 10 weeks ago....

Wrap-up

Things finally were going right for the Vikings yesterday, and even though it was against the Raiders, I decided I'm going to look at it as a pretty big step forward rather than just a normal step. The Vikings came to play ball yesterday, and that was very apparent. They looked good on all ends of the field and came out with a 29-22 victory. Chester Taylor, who was bumped back into the starting slot because of Adrian Peterson's injury, showed why he deserves to be a starter in the NFL when he tore apart the Raider's D with 164 yards rushing and 3 touchdowns. Even Tavaris Jackson showed some poise as he completed 17 of 22 passes for 171 yards and a pick. Receiver Sidney Rice got into the passing game with his first two attempts and completions on two trick plays executed by the Vikings. The Vikings defense looked great in limiting the Raiders offense to only 61 yards rushing. The Vikings D did struggle against the pass again, this time the victim of former Vikings Quarterback Daunte Culpepper. Culpepper completed 23 of 39 passes for 344 yards and a touchdown to go along with two fumbles and an interception. The victory moved the Vikings record to 4-6, good for third in the division ahead of the Chicago Bears.

Although it was a terrible Sunday of Football for my fantasy team, it was a very entertaining day to watch. For the Baltimore Ravens though, it may be a day they want to take back after having the victory taken away from them after 5 minutes of the referees discussing whether or not Phil Dawson's field goal made its way through the uprights. With only a few seconds left on the clock, the Browns lined up for a 51 yard field goal to try to tie the Ravens at 30. When Dawson let the kick fly, it wound up hitting the right upright, bouncing down onto the crossbar, and ricocheting out of the goal-post. The kick was originally ruled to be no good, so the Ravens started celebrating and heading to the locker room. But after a few minutes of review, the call was reversed when the ball was deemed to have hit the bar that connects the goal-post, meaning the ball was inside the post and bounced out. The Browns then received the kick in overtime, drove down the field, and then won with another Phil Dawson field goal, this time from 31 yards.

After watching the Patriots play again last night, I have come up with this conclusion: a team is better off forfeiting their game against the Patriots to avoid an embarrassing loss. This time, the Buffalo Bills were the team that acted as the Patriots punching bag, getting beaten up 56-10. Tom Brady was his usual self completing 31 of 39 passes for a paltry 371 yards and 5 touchdowns. Oh yeah, and four of those five touchdowns went to Randy Moss, who racked up 128 receiving yards to go with those four scores. It's a testament to the Patriots when they go out on the field, score on 7 of their first 8 possessions, and nobody is surprised. After 10 games in which the Patriots average more than 41 points a game, it's not shocking at all that they are doing the things they do. It's fun to have a team like that who you can count on to put on a great offensive show every game. Here are the other scores from Sunday's action:

Tampa Bay over Atlanta 31-7
Arizona over Cincinnati 35-27
NY Giants over Detroit 16-10
Green Bay over Carolina 31-17
Indianapolis over Kansas City 13-10
Philadelphia over Miami 17-7
Jacksonville over San Diego 24-17
Houston over New Orleans 23-10
NY Jets over Pittsburgh 19-16
Dallas over Washington 28-23
St. Louis over San Francisco 13-9
Seattle over Chicago 30-23

Other action going on last night showcased the Minnesota Wild facing the division leading Colorado Avalanche. Unfortunately, the Wild were without their best center Mikko Koivu who suffered a cracked bone in his leg due to a cowardly and selfish act by Canucks Defensemen Mattias Ohlund. Ohlund received a 4 game suspension from league disciplinarian Colin Campbell yesterday, and I must say I am very disappointed to say the least. Four games for a two-handed, intentional stick-swinging act is a joke. Ohlund could have very easily broken Koivu's leg with his vicious attack, yet he only sits out for a few games. People keep bringing up that Koivu looked like he tried to elbow Ohlund right before the slash happened, but if you study the play more closely, you can tell that Koivu was simply trying to get around Ohlund and brought his arm up. Anybody that watches the Wild knows that Koivu is not the type of player that plays dirty. That type of behavior that Ohlund showed is what the NHL has vowed to try to cut out of the game, yet when something like that happens, they give the guy a minor suspension. I personally was calling for a 15-20 game suspension, but obviously I don't work in the NHL's discipline department so I have no say in the matter. Anyway, back to the game. The Wild got offense from the most surprising of players and collected a 4-1 win to leap-frog them over the Avalanche and into first place in the division. Aaron Voros, Stephane Veilleux, and Matt Foy all collected goals to help the Wild break out of their offensive slump. James Sheppard added two assists for his first two-point game in his NHL career. The Wild played a good all around game, skating well and getting back to the Jacques Lemaire-style Hockey that they have been missing. They played tight defense in allowing only 7 shots in the first period and 6 in the third. Josh Harding stopped 27 of 28 shots to earn the victory after a few recent shaky outings. Hopefully the Wild can take this game and use it to propel them forward as they continue to try to right the ship and get back to the type of Hockey they were playing in the first eight games of the season.

That's all for today. I'll try to re-cap the Monday night game between Tennessee and Denver if I can. If I don't write by then, I will definitely have something up next Thursday so I can share my thoughts on the upcoming Wild-Canucks game that is to be played on Wednesday.

Week 9 Football

Well, the game of the century is over. Super Bowl 41 1/2 as some dubbed it. Whatever it was, it was a hell of a game. In most sports blogs, this game may be the first thing talked about, in others it may be the only thing talked about. But for me, the number one story of the Football day was none other than Adrian "All Day" Peterson. As a tried and true Vikings fan for many years, it is absolutely great to see this guy run through defenses like there's nothing to it. If for some reason you don't know what AD did yesterday, here is his line:

30 carries
296 rushing yards
3 touchdowns

Those 296 rushing yards set a new NFL single-game rushing record, beating Jamal Lewis' record of 295 yards set back in 2003. Oh yeah, AD is also only a rookie playing in his eighth career game. If that doesn't impress you, I don't know if you can call yourself a Football fan. I do have to mention that AD did lose a fumble in Chargers territory, but why focus on the negative when there is so much more positive?
Back to the other game. In the game that was said to be the best in over a decade, the Patriots and Colts did not disappoint. In a game that featured two of the best quarterbacks ever, Tom Brady and the Patriots came out on top 24-20. Here are the stats for both Quarterbacks:

Brady: 21/32 255 yards 3 td 2 int
Peyton Manning: 16/27 225 yards 1 td 1 int 1 fumble lost

Statistically speaking, Brady did have a better game, but both Quarterbacks played well enough for their respective teams to win. The score was close for most of the game, with Brady having to lead a comeback after being down 20-10 with less than ten minutes to play. Brady swiftly led the Patriots on two consecutive touchdown drives, one score on a short pass to Wes Welker and another on a short pass over the middle to Kevin Faulk who took it 13 yards to the the house. The Patriots defense was outstanding at the end of the game, forcing Manning to fumble twice to seal the victory. The win over the Colts kept the Patriots undefeated at 9-0 going into their bye week, and the loss dropped the Colts to 7-1 before their showdown with the San Diego Chargers next week.
Here are all the others scores of the week:

Atlanta over San Francisco 20-16
Buffalo over Cincinnati 33-21
Detroit over Denver 44-7
Green Bay over Kansas City 33-22
Minnesota over San Diego 35-17
New Orleans over Jacksonville 41-24
Washington over NY Jets 23-20 OT
Tampa Bay over Arizona 17-10
Tennessee over Carolina 20-7
Cleveland over Seattle 33-30 OT
Houston over Oakland 24-17
Dallas over Philadelphia 38-17

Minnesota Wild play tonight at home against Edmonton. The Wild will be missing Gaborik and Demitra again, but they played strong Saturday against Calgary so hopefully they can keep the confidence and ride it.