Sunday night's game was perhaps the best Super Bowl I have ever watched. The Super Bowl is always a great occasion -- good company, good food, good football. But the 17-14 thriller between the Giants and the Patriots was memorable for a variety of reasons, and not just because the Big Blue from New York ended the Golden Boy's run at perfection after 18 consecutive wins.
Biggest Surprise
Sure, it was shocking that the score after three full quarters was only 7-3 in favor of New England, as the over/under on the game was established by many books at 54 points. Of course it's simply unbelievable that the Giants ruined the Patriots' bid for an undefeated season with a last-minute touchdown. But the biggest surprises of the game may have been the complete dominance of the G-Men defense and the fact that the younger Manning outplayed Tom Brady..
The Giants sacked Brady five times -- including a huge, punishing hit that forced a third-and-20 situation for the Pats with 19 seconds left in the game -- after Brady had been sacked only 21 times during the entire regular season. Who would have thought Plaxico Burress' prediction that the Patriots would only score 17 points was an overstatement of their offense?New England only tallied 274 yards of total offense, including a whopping 45 yards rushing. And, the highly-touted Pats' secondary was outplayed by the highly-criticized Giants' secondary.
Meanwhile, Eli Manning earned MVP honors with a solid 19-for-34 passing night for 255 yards and two touchdowns. He made a tremendous play to scramble out of a sack to hit David Tyree for a 32-yard gain with just a little more than a minute left in the fourth quarter? on a play where Tyree used his helmet to protect the ball and secure a completion. Talk about using your head to make a play. Brady threw for more yards, but couldn't lead his team to a last-second, game-winning drive like he had done before.
Best Advertisement
The top ad from the Super Bowl has to go to Audi, for referencing one of the most memorable scenes from one of the greatest movies of all time. The setup: an older man in a nice house, in his gold robe, under gold sheets, with the camera panning in. I recognized right away this was a spoof on "The Godfather," but I was genuinely interested to see who was the brains behind the commercial. It became apparent the man in the bed was covered in motor oil, and not blood from a horses' head, so the question was: Which car company rolled out a new product? Props to Audi on the great commercial and a sweet-looking new ride. (Audi, you can thank me for this plug with a new R8. Thanks.)
A close second goes to the Will Ferrell advertisement for Bud Light, followed by both Cars.com commercials, especially the witch doctor version. "Hey Ted, can I take off? I got a tiny head" was the best line from any of the Super Bowl ads. If you haven't seen these, you need to. YouTube has all the commercials on a channel called "AdBlitz"
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