Sports Redux: Who Said You Can't Win 'Em All?

Like so many teams before them, the New York Giants gave it everything they had. And like everyone else before them, they could only watch helplessly as Tom Brady and company engineered another beautiful fourth-quarter comeback to win the game, and become the first team in the 16-game era to run the table.

It was very scary for a long time, though. Eli Manning looked more like his poised brother than the skittish quarterback we expected, carving through a lackluster Patriot defense on a couple of long drives. The special teams fell asleep, allowing Domenik Hixon to run a kickoff back for a touchdown. This, seconds after the Patriots treated the NFL Record Book like an Etch-a-Sketch, shaking it clean and installing Brady, Moss, and the team in general into football history.

So the Giants were feeling pretty good late into the third quarter with a 12-point lead. But as so many have learned, when Tom Brady decides your time is up, your time is most assuredly up. Hitting mostly Wes Welker and Kevin Faulk, Brady drove the Pats down the field, giving it to Maroney to score the touchdown to make it five. The next drive, Brady threw a bomb off Randy Moss' hands, then did the exact same thing (but successfully) on the next play, to take the lead. Force a killer Eli Manning interception, and that pretty much wraps that up. Good valiant game by the Giants, who are probably going to get smoked in Tampa next week after the bruising this one left on them.

Coach Bill was as warm as he ever gets postgame, talking about how proud he was of the team's achievement, and how he knows they have to get back to work and prepare for the playoffs, but he wanted to give the team some time (about six minutes was the on-field estimate) to reflect and enjoy what happened in the regular season. The first press question was "Coach, what's it mean to be 16-0?" "I just talked about that," said Bill, and that was it for HappyCoachHour.

Meanwhile out West, the Celtics were playing a very close game as well, going down to the wire before pulling out a win at Utah. From the snippets we saw while flipping during Pats commercials, we're going to guess Pierce and Rondo had good games, but we'll read more about that once the Patriot euphoria dies down. The Bruins, we don't even want to think about today.