Giants 41 Vikings 0
Before the roar and the confetti and the whirling towels and their sheer brilliance and the utter jubilation of a magical moment cascaded down upon them, there was a calm.
A quiet, controlled feeling that permeated through them, empowering them, turning them for one glorious and remarkable afternoon into a perfect football machine. One by one, they took the field, simply knowing they would win and believing they would dominate. It hit them during the week and created a serenity that was both overwhelming and awesome to behold.
Early in the week, the offensive players knew.
“We had an ace in our hand and nobody even knew we had it,” Amani Toomer said.
Late in the week, the defensive players were clued in.
“On Friday, you could see it,” cornerback Dave Thomas said.
The Giants were sitting on a secret and when it was released with all its fury, it carried them into Super Bowl XXXV, where they will face the Ravens in Tampa, where few, if any, dared dream this astonishing season would end.
They were confident, no make that certain, that they would beat the Vikings in yesterday’s NFC Championship Game. Their offensive coordinator, Sean Payton, had a gameplan he knew would be lethal. John Fox, the defensive coordinator, late in the week told general manager Ernie Accorsi, “We’re going to be OK.”
“We walked on the field, they were acting like they were really going to beat us,” Toomer said, “but we were just like, ‘We’re going to win, you guys can just go home, because we’re going to win.’ This is the most confident I’ve ever been going into a game.”
With that, the Giants proceeded to assemble their version of The Perfect Game. A barrage of points, a barrage of suffocating defensive stops, a barrage featuring every imaginable mode of devastation. Passing records shattered by Kerry Collins, points rolled up like a pinball machine, the total dismantling of the Vikings’ supposedly unstoppable scoring attack. It was fast and it was furious and it was over nearly before it started. The Giants did not merely advance, they soared to an impossible-to-fathom 41-0 crushing of the Vikings, leaving another record crowd at Giants Stadium nearly out of cheers and salutes.
The poor, pathetic Vikings never had a chance.
“It was amazing,” Tiki Barber said. “It was awesome, it was something to behold. When it’s clicking, it’s almost like you can’t be stopped.”
It was clicking. It was all clicking. The Giants, a 50-1 shot to make it to the Super Bowl prior to the season, are back in the big game for the first time in 10 years, ready to take on the world. The Giants got there with Lawrence Taylor and other former heroes watching from their sideline. They are 14-4, they upheld their No. 1 seeding in the NFC and they disproved so much of the heaping criticism that always seems to accompany them that they have forged a mighty bond with the franchise’s greatness of the past.
“This is a Giants team that was referred to as the worst team to ever win home-field advantage,” said Wellington Mara, the Giants’ 84-year old co-owner. “We proved that we’re the worst team to ever win the NFC Championship.
“I’m happy to say in that in two weeks we’re going to try to become the worst team ever to win the Super Bowl.”
There was an emotional release of staggering proportions. Collins, the quarterback whose career was once in ruins, playing a game for the ages (28 of 39, 381 yards, 5 TDs, 2 INTs), shredding a truly dreadful Minnesota secondary. A defense that was supposed to try and contain the potent Vikings pulverized them, allowing no points, treating towering Daunte Culpepper (78 passing yards) like a giant stuffed animal, sacking him four times and intercepting him three times. They humbled receivers Randy Moss (two catches, 18 yards) and Cris Carter (3-24). The numbers were too one-sided to comprehend. The Giants outgained the Vikings 518-114, held the ball for 42:22, had 31 first downs and punted once the entire day.
Afterward, Jessie Armstead pulled a small piece of paper out from under the podium in the interview room. He had placed it their prior to the game. He unfolded it and read what he had written: “Giants 31, Vikings 17.” It was about the only thing the Giants did not have exactly right.
“There’s one team in this league that already calls itself America’s team,” Fassel said, “but you know what, we’re living the American dream. We’re the American dream.”
It was Fassel who guaranteed a spot in the playoffs the day before Thanksgiving and ever since, his Giants are 7-0.
It was 14-0 before the ravenous Giants defense ever got a chance to take the field and inflict its damage. There was a fear that the Vikings would deflate the crowd by striking quickly, but it was the Giants who came out with such fury that it was as if they had not eaten in a week and the Vikings were raw meat.
This was a spanking, a bludgeoning, a beating so thorough that there was a moment when the Vikings almost required pity. The weather was to their liking, as moderate as a mid-January can be around these parts, but they played as if frozen in time.
“We didn’t even put up a fight,” Vikings tackle Todd Steussie said.
There is no adequate way to describe the utter disregard the Giants had for the Minnesota defense and the utter disdain they showed to a Vikings secondary that so incompetent that Collins and his receivers have had more trouble in summer seven-on-seven drills. All week, the Giants were sitting on this little secret like kids awaiting recess. They knew they would throw the ball and knew, just knew, they could make the Vikes pay for bringing in such a shabby defense.
But this? Collins hit Toomer for 16 yards on the very first play and there was no stopping this Big Blue machine. Less than two minutes into this game, it was 7-0 when Hilliard (10-155, 2 TDs) obliterated Keith Thibodeaux and Collins hit him in stride for a 46-yard TD.
“That first drive, we went through them like a knife through hot butter,” fullback Greg Comella said.
Showing a complete lack of fire in a game of this magnitude, the Vikes then fumbled the ensuing kickoff when Moe Williams and Troy Walters simply watched a bouncing ball flop around on the grass. Lyle West pounced on it on the Minnesota 18-yard line. Collins, like a surgeon, fired into the right corner of the end zone to fullback Greg Comella for an easy touchdown. A mere 137 seconds into a title game, it was 14-0 and the rout was indeed on. Before long, Collins found Joe Jurevicius for a TD and then Hilliard again just 12 seconds before halftime to make it 34-0.
“I wish everybody in the world can feel like I’m feeling right now,” Keith Hamilton said.
“This is one of those great dreams that you always end up waking up too early,” added Comella. “This one we haven’t woke up yet.”