Just the same, there was an awful lot of history riding on this game. The Patriots were 18-0 and looking to do what only the 1972 Dolphins had done — finish the season as undefeated champions. They were also looking to join the Cowboys, 49ers and Steelers as the only teams with at least four Super Bowl trophies. Tom Brady was looking to join Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw as the only quarterbacks to win four trophies, and his coach, Bill Belichick, was in line to join the Steelers’ Chuck Noll as the only coach to win four.

The Giants, meanwhile, were riding an NFL record 10-game road winning streak, the longest in league history. That string included playoff victories in Tampa, Dallas and Green Bay, the last two against two of the game’s most storied franchises, and the last one over its greatest living legend, quarterback Brett Favre.

Special feature Biggest Super Bowl upsets Eli Manning and the Giants stunned the Patriots, but where does it rank among NFL’s historic wins? msnbc.com

If there was a true upset involved, it was the way perception was overturned. Belichick and Brady in New England were already immortals when the season began, and their glory only grew as the season went on. But the Giants’ coach, Tom Coughlin, came into the season known as a shrill and picayune old shrew who shouldn’t even have a job in the NFL. And halfway through the season, a lot of Giants fans had written off Manning as a kid who would be a decent quarterback, but never a great one, not one whose name would ever be spoken in the same breath with those of  Charlie Connerly, Y.A. Tittle and Phil Simms. They’d never win a Super Bowl with him, more than a few fans told me; he didn’t have the magic, the charisma, the toughness. He didn’t have “it.”

And then as the games got bigger, so did he. Manning went through four games in the postseason throwing just one interception, and that was off a deflection in the first half Sunday. He was battered and harassed, but he never lost his cool. In the end, he out-Bradyed Brady, leading a drive that even Joe Montana could envy.

Then there was the little bit of intrigue the Giants’ voluble wide receiver Plaxico Burress had added during the week, when he told the media that the Giants would win the game and the score would be 23-17.

Turns out Burress gave the Patriots too much credit — and three more points than they actually  scored. Tom Brady had scoffed at that prediction, suggesting that 40 points would be more like it.

After spending much of his work day being pounded into the University of Phoenix Stadium turf by the Giants’ implacable pass rush, Brady was turned into a fairly ordinary quarterback. Still, he did what he’s paid to do, driving his team the length of the field late in the second half to take a 14-10 lead. With 2:42 on the clock and the oft-criticized Manning huddling up his team for its final drive, it seemed as if New England would win as they’ve done all season.

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

And then Manning did what all his critics said he couldn’t do. He drove his team the length of the field, scrambled out of a sack on third-and-5 and found Tyree. Capped it off with 35 seconds left with a touchdown pass to Burress — No. 17 — to make the score 17-14 and turn back the Patriots at the very gates of immortality.

“You can’t write a better script,” said the second quarterback named Manning to be named the Super Bowl MVP in as many years. “And then to go out and do it?

“What a thrill.”

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