We’ll be doing a series of network-wide themed post leading up to this year’s Super Bowl, and the first question asks about our best Super Bowl moments. Ideally, that moment would pertain to a time when the Cleveland Browns went to the Super Bowl, but the Browns are one of the few teams yet to make it there and I cannot cheat and use the team’s eight Championships (and besides, I wasn’t even around for those).
If our own team didn’t make it, it was suggested we consider relishing in a division rival losing in the Super Bowl. While that did happen in 2011 when the Packers defeated the Steelers 31-25, that game didn’t have a personal long-lasting effect on me.
The game that stands out to me was in 2004, when the New England Patriots defeated the Carolina Panthers 32-29. I’m still a relatively young football fan compared to some, and those who have read Dawgs By Nature closely know that the 2002 season was the first year in which I REALLY became a die-hard Browns fan, living and dying with every play of the season. That also included following other NFL team too.
That year’s Super Bowl wasn’t much of a game, as the Buccaneers blew out the Raiders 48-21. The Patriots-Panthers game, therefore, was the first tightly-contested Super Bowl I had watched. I can’t quite explain why, but besides the Browns and Peyton Manning, I also felt a connection/rooting interest for Jake Delhomme. Despite a quiet third quarter in which no one scored, the action went back-and-forth in the final quarter of play.
What a finish, and clutch moment and clutch moment to close out the game. I know there have been some exciting finishes in Super Bowls since then, but this is the game that’ll always have special relevance to me. (And the whole Janet Jackson situation was a big story too, though I remember that I missed it because I was taking a shower at the half).
How about you, Browns fans? Do you have that one Super Bowl game or moment that stands out as your favorite?