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ESPN.com - NFL - NFC championship game: Saints at Bears: Now Do You Believe?
Well ... not really.
However, I can't say the Saints gave away this game the way the Seahawks gave away their game. Or rather, the Saints gave it away to the extent that the Bears literally took it away, with four turnovers. And the Bears demonstrated that as long as Rex doesn't actually hurt them, they can deal perfectly well with him having a less than average game. The first grounding penalty against Brees was thoroughly odd -- not that he didn't do it, but it looked as though the officials talked each other into actually calling the penalty somehow. Notwithstanding, New Orleans really wasn't a factor after early in the third quarter.
In the meantime, south of Lake Michigan, Indianapolis finally sucked it up and beat New England. And now Indy is installed as a one-touchdown favorite over the Bears. Given a rather odd statistical dominance over New England -- the statistics look as though the Colts pushed New England all over the field, rather than having to come from behind to win a close game -- and the fact that their playoff strengths play into the Bears' playoff weaknesses, that's somewhat understandable. (Indianapolis is having a severe case of "Where the hell did THIS team come from?"; they've held all three postseason opponents under 100 total yards rushing after having had the notorious #31-ranked rushing defense coming into the playoffs.
As Dungy said, pity they can't just play the game in Fort Wayne. And it's a good thing that this isn't baseball; nobody outside Chicago and Indiana would watch this game if it were.
Well ... not really.
However, I can't say the Saints gave away this game the way the Seahawks gave away their game. Or rather, the Saints gave it away to the extent that the Bears literally took it away, with four turnovers. And the Bears demonstrated that as long as Rex doesn't actually hurt them, they can deal perfectly well with him having a less than average game. The first grounding penalty against Brees was thoroughly odd -- not that he didn't do it, but it looked as though the officials talked each other into actually calling the penalty somehow. Notwithstanding, New Orleans really wasn't a factor after early in the third quarter.
In the meantime, south of Lake Michigan, Indianapolis finally sucked it up and beat New England. And now Indy is installed as a one-touchdown favorite over the Bears. Given a rather odd statistical dominance over New England -- the statistics look as though the Colts pushed New England all over the field, rather than having to come from behind to win a close game -- and the fact that their playoff strengths play into the Bears' playoff weaknesses, that's somewhat understandable. (Indianapolis is having a severe case of "Where the hell did THIS team come from?"; they've held all three postseason opponents under 100 total yards rushing after having had the notorious #31-ranked rushing defense coming into the playoffs.
As Dungy said, pity they can't just play the game in Fort Wayne. And it's a good thing that this isn't baseball; nobody outside Chicago and Indiana would watch this game if it were.
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