Getty ImagesHello? 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.
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 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.
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