Contact Sports Director Bruce.Rader@wavy.com

 

 I  don’t know what the rest of you did this weekend, but I spent the past two days watching four football games.

 

 As we all expected at the beginning of the season, it will be the Arizona Cardinals against the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC championship game next week.

 

 Is that unbelievable?  Either the Cardinals are the Eagles are going to be in the Super Bowl this year.

 

 Talk about how crazy the NFL is this season, the Redskins played the Cardinals once and the Eagles twice and the Redskins won all three games.

 

 But, both teams very deserving, but I was enormously impressed by Kurt Warner and the Cardinals, and very embarrassed that I even made note of the fact that the Cardinals did not play well when they came to the east coast, which they didn’t before Saturday night, but still that was ridiculous to even talk about that last week, because that doesn’t mean anything.            

 

The Carolina Panthers were certainly the biggest disappointment of the playoffs, although we’ll get to Eli Manning in a moment, and with four interceptions and a fumble recovery hats off to the Arizona defense, and an excellent Cardinals offense, with Larry Fitzgerald hauling in those Warner passes, I really think Larry Fitzgerald is one of the best receivers in football, I thought he was when he played in college.

 

The Cardinals crushed the Panthers 33 to 13, Carolina playing one of the worst playoff games I have seen in a long time.

 

I have to give the Cardinals the edge this weekend in the NFC championship game.

 

 Although I am sure the Eagles fans aren’t going to agree with me after their impressive 23 to 11 victory over the Giants yesterday.

 

Just 11 months ago the Giants shocked us all by winning the Super Bowl; yesterday they shocked us again, wasting a 12-4 season, home-field advantage and the No. 1 seed with a flat performance, to say the least.

 

The Giants defense played pretty well, but Eli Manning’s offense blew opportunity after opportunity.

 

 Eli threw two costly interceptions, while Donovan McNabb had another outstanding game he did throw two interceptions, but finished with 217 yards, a touchdown and a big throw on a third-and-20 conversion on a third-quarter field goal drive that gave the Eagles the lead for good.

               

By the way, I picked both the Panthers and Giants to win.

 

AFC

 

It will be the Baltimore Ravens against the Pittsburgh Steelers in the AFC championship game, I did pick these two teams, and I think this is going to be a great football game, I think the game they played in the regular season was one of the best games I saw all year.

 

Baltimore went on the road and beat the top seed Tennessee Titans 13 to 10.  Unlike the top seeded Giants, the Titans played a very good game in my opinion, but Baltimore’s great defense and the amazing play of their rookie quarterback Joe Flacco took the game down to the wire, where Matt Stover nailed a game winning field goal in the final minute.

 

Matt Stover’s 40 years old.

 

The Ravens defense forced 3 fumbles and picked off a pass, and their offense never turned the ball over once.

 

But, it is not going to be easy beating the Pittsburgh Steelers. Last night Ben Roethlisberger led the Steelers to a 35-24 win over the Chargers at Heinz Field. The Steelers will remain at home for Sunday’s AFC Championship Game against the wild-card Ravens. (6:30) I know you Steelers fans were a little worried there down 7 nothing early, and then what 10-7, but the Steelers seemed to play better as the game went on, while the other teams in the playoffs that had byes last week did not seem to play well, did you notice that.

I thought Ben Rothlisberger had a good game, but I think was Willie Parker that for me put the Steelers offense over the top, it was certainly the best game Willie has played this year, and maybe it was the best game in his career considering the stage.  146 yards and two touchdowns.

The Steelers were the only home team to win this weekend. 

And it was the first playoff win for Coach Mike Tomlin who is from Newport News, and who is a great guy, and I am so happy for him, and I really want to see Mike Tomlin in the Super Bowl, so I am going to be rooting for the Steelers this weekend against the Ravens, but the Ravens are tough.

               

               

 

 

 

 

               

 

               

 

Tags: Arizona Cardinals, Baltimore Ravens, Bruce Rader, Carolina Panthers, Mike Tomlin, NFL Playoffs, Philadelphia Eagles, Pittsburgh Steelers