“This is why I started 13 years ago,” Bettis said. “Along the way, I amassed a lot of yards and a lot of Pro Bowls, but none of that was significant because it wasn’t the team goals. The team goal has always been to win a championship, and now I have a championship.”

The Braves have plenty of championships, though most of them are of the regular-season variety. Beginning with the worst-to-first season of 1991, they put together an amazing run of 14 straight division titles — unmatched in any of the four major sports.

The streak ended with a resounding thud in 2006. Atlanta didn’t even get a chance to do its usual postseason flop, plodding to the finish in third place, 18 games behind the New York Mets in the NL East.

“It does feel as bad as I thought it would,” said John Smoltz, the only guy who was there from the first division title to the last. “Not the fact that we’re not in. It’s the fact that we’re not even close.”

Florida had been close before in men’s basketball, getting all the way to the title game in 2000 before losing to Michigan State. Still, the Gators were used to playing second fiddle on their own campus to the football team, which dominated the Southeastern Conference for years under swashbuckling coach Steve Spurrier.

That lack of status didn’t stop Billy Donovan from building a power of his own. Ten years after the “Kid” arrived in Gainesville — ignoring the advice of his mentor, Rick Pitino — the Gators reached the top with a resounding 73-57 win over UCLA, the grandest name in the sport. As if to show just how unorthodox this journey was, Florida was led to its championship by Joakim Noah, the son of a French tennis star.

“This is the best I’ve ever felt in my life,” Noah said. “You work so hard for these moments. They’re so worth it.”

Florida wasn’t even the biggest surprise at the Final Four. That distinction belonged to George Mason, a commuter school in suburban Washington that became America’s team with its run to Indianapolis.

But no team was more inspiring than the Saints, who fled New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and were forced to play their entire 2005 season on the road.

With much of the city still in ruins but the Superdome having undergone a hurried, $185 million renovation, the Saints returned in September for their first post-Katrina home game. They brought along Reggie Bush, who inexplicably was passed over by Houston in the draft and fell to a city that needed all the good news it could get.

Slideshow   The Week in Sports Pictures A kayaker flips out, a racehorse eyes the Triple Crown and more. more photos

Although a sport played by millionaires has done little to relieve the actual suffering in devastated areas such as the Lower Ninth Ward, the Saints have done their part to make the Big Easy feel a little better about itself. After going 3-13 last season, they won the NFC South and earned a first-round playoff under rookie coach Sean Payton and a potent lineup led by Bush and quarterback Drew Brees.

“It meant a lot to them when the Saints didn’t leave in their time of need,” Bush said. “When the people of New Orleans needed something to look to for confidence and something to be proud of, they looked to the Saints.”

Even with all the drug scandals, inflated egos, out-of-control salaries and spiraling ticket prices, one team — the Saints — and one speedskater — Cheek — showed sports still has the power to amaze and inspire.

Maybe that’s the biggest surprise of 2006.