Super Bowl XLIII: Cardinals Stun Steelers, then Lose

I've been saying it for two weeks: the only thing I would be cheering for on Super Bowl Sunday would be Larry Fitzgerald's hands. So naturally for three quarters I had squat to cheer about. The Steelers ran the clock, held onto the ball and kept Kurt's offense off the field (which meant less throws to them hands). Then suddenly a miracle happened, the Cardinals were in position to take the lead deep in Steeler territory. This looked like a perfect time to loft one into the corner for Fitz... but no. Instead Warner decides to force a bullet past the linebackers and gets picked off by the mighty James Harrison (you know, the Defensive Player of the Year who should've been thrown out after that insane personal foul on that punt later in the game?). Harrison thinks to himself, "you know what hasn't been done in a Super Bowl before? A 100-yard interception returned for a touchdown! Think I'll do that!" So Harrison sprints and stumbles and bumbles his way to the opposite endzone, capping a huge momentum swing in the Steelers favor. Things were dire for the poor Cardinals. Where was Fitz? How would they recover? Oh I don't know - the same way they had been all postseason.


The third quarter came and went and the Steelers stood tall on a 13 point lead, knowing full well that no team had ever held a 10+ point lead in the Super Bowl and lost the game. Clearly they haven't watched the NFC playoffs this year. Fitzy took his 5-hour energy shot and jumped right into the fray, making big catch after big catch. Capping off a solid drive with that patented jump ball in the endzone I had hoped for earlier. Cardinals within six.

Then came the vaunted Cards defense. That's right.. THAT Cardinals defense. Roethlisberger couldn't get anything moving, could barely get the ball out of his own red-zone. All the momentum had flown west for the winter. After being pinned inside at the goal line after a solid punt+personal foul combination (thank you Mr. Harrison), the Steelers' young quarterback tried everything he could to not allow a safety. He was incredible. He danced around wave after wave of tacklers, managing to fire a bullet to Holmes down the field. This was bad for Arizona. This may have meant the game. If only the Steelers' offensive line had their heads on straight: holding in the endzone. That meant a safety, two points for the Cardinals AND the ball. Now within four points, the Cardinals had nearly four minutes to drive down the field and put this game away.

Warner steps back, looks across the middle, finds Fitzgerald crossing over and fires him a bullet... its caught! Fitz is flying down the middle of the field and the safeties are nowhere to be found! Polamalu can't catch him! No one's going to catch him! Larry Fitzgerald has taken it to the house! Arizona has the lead! A 16-point rally to take the lead in Super Bowl XLIII! (let's also note that this touchdown gave Fitz the record for the most in a single postseason).

But they left too much time on the clock.

Roethlisberger is very good at this.

Suspiciously good.

So Ben hits Santonio Holmes... and again... and again.. and oh look he's running downfield for another twenty yards, great now they're on the six yard line with less than a minute left. Beautiful, at the very least we're headed to overtime. They'll probably hand it to Parke--- wait, he's throwing! To the corner! It looks to high - its... caught?? NO WAY! UNBELIEVABLE WHAT A CATCH! Holmes kept those toes in bounds! THOSE DAMN TOES!!! Steelers are up by four with 30 seconds left, its all but over. Well okay, its over. Enough with the play-by-play.

The Steelers blew this game. Without Harrison's pick six to end the first half, or Warner's inability to finish off drives in Steeler territory twice in the fourth quarter, the Cardinals are Super Bowl Champions. But that's what the Steelers are all about: defense. They expect their defense to make the big plays and their quarterback to just keep them in the game. They played their style and were able to steal the game back in the final moments. Gotta give them credit.

So for the sixth time the Steelers are Super Bowl champions (most by any franchise), for the second time Ben Roethlisberger is the winning quarterback (and neither time the MVP), and for the second time a black head coach hoisted the Lombardi Trophy (wow Dungy's record really latsed a long time..) - and all offseason long we'll be hearing from sports talk fanatics about how Kurt Warner shouldn't be let into the Hall of Fame because he lost this game. The NFL season is over, and what I thought would be a boring game ended up being as exciting as any Super Bowl I can remember. We've found two new superstars in this game in Santonio Holmes and Larry Fitzgerald, and let's hope that the upstart Cardinals don't fall the way of the Colorado Rockies.. and followup a conference championship with a season in the cellar.

Now then.. who're the Falcons gonna take in the first round?