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Tom Brady threw for an NFL record 50 touchdown passes this season.

Hello? The Patriots, of course, enter the Super Bowl on an 18-game win streak, the second longest in NFL history, and have won eight straight on the road.

The 15-game difference in win streaks (18 for New England, 3 for New York), is the greatest in Super Bowl history.

In fact, you have to go all the way back to that infamous 1934 NFL championship game to find a contest that pitted teams with a greater disparity in win streaks.

And, yes, there is a ray of hope there for Big Blue fans: The Bears entered the 1934 championship game with a perfect 13-0 record and winners of 18 straight dating back to 1933. The 8-5 Giants lost their season finale in 1934, so they boasted a win streak of 0 games. Yet, as noted above, the Giants shocked the unbeaten Bears, 30-13.

Greatest mismatch, period
There have been only a handful of Super Bowls that looked like mismatches from the outset. None were a bigger statistical mismatch than Giants-Patriots.

• Super Bowl III — The mighty 1968 Colts were 13-1 when they faced the 11-3 Jets. But the 1968 Colts were not as dominant as the 2007 Patriots. And the 1968 Jets (who outscored opponents by nearly 10 PPG) were far more impressive than the 2007 Giants (who outscored opponents by 1.4 PPG). Sure, the Jets played in the AFL, but as they and the Chiefs proved the following year by knocking off two of the NFL’s greatest teams in consecutive Super Bowls, there was no gap between the NFL and AFL.
• Super Bowl VII — The 14-0 Dolphins were just three games better than the 11-3 Redskins. And, because Miami played such an easy schedule, Washington was actually favored over the undefeated Dolphins in Super Bowl VII.
• Super Bowl XX — The mighty 15-1 Bears vs. plucky 11-5 Patriots is probably the greatest statistical mismatch of the first 41 Super Bowls. But those two teams were closer statistically by every real and imaginable measure than the 16-0 Patriots and 10-6 Giants.
• Super Bowl XXXVI — The “Greatest Show on Turf” Rams (14-2) were just three games better than the upstart Patriots (11-5) and were closer statistically by every real and imaginable measure than the 16-0 Patriots and 10-6 Giants.

New England statistically dominated the first meeting
The Giants were universally praised for battling toe-to-toe against the Patriots in Week 17, before falling 38-35. The Cold, Hard Football Facts called it the greatest moral victory in history, for the confidence of that day seemed to propel the Giants through their surprising three-game playoff run.

We went back through the Week 17 meeting between the Patriots and Giants, looking to uncover the statistical secrets to what was — by any measure — New York’s most impressive game to date, staying within 3 points of a team that had beat its first 15 opponents by 20 PPG.

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• The Patriots controlled the clock for more than 36 minutes. The Patriots punted twice and scored on 7 of 9 drives (if you take away the kneel-down drives at the end of the half and the game).  
• Tom Brady had his standard clutch performance (116.8 passer rating, including a 130.6 rating in the fourth quarter). 
• Two New England receivers reached the century mark (Wes Welker, 122 yards; Randy Moss, 100 yards).
• The Patriots generated 390 yards of offense and 27 first downs, to just 316 and 19 for the Giants. 
• The Patriots shredded the Giants for 22 unanswered points through the third and fourth quarters when the game appeared in doubt.

The Giants were boosted by a career performance by Eli Manning, who tied a personal best with 4 TD passes. Were it not for a 74-yard kick return by New York’s Domenik Hixon in the second quarter, it’s quite likely the Patriots would have been sporting a 38-21 lead with two minutes to play in the game.

And remember, relative to the expected performance of each team (more on those relative performances later this week), that was New York's best game of the year.

If the Giants can play better than their best game of the year, return another kick (or pick) for a score, and limit the Patriots to scores on, say, 6 of 9 drives, then they have a good shot at turning in the Upset of the Century.

But right now, any way you measure it, we're looking at the Mismatch of the Century.