The Left Hash is back for one more glorious run. It’s the Super Bowl edition. There won’t be another one until the 2010 campaign.
In a season of firsts, the Saints have nearly reached the pinnacle of professional football. They’re in the Super Bowl for the first time ever; ergo, a win on Sunday against the Indianapolis Colts would bring New Orleans its first-ever championship.
How’d the Saints get here? It wasn’t easy. New Orleans started 13-0, then went 0-3. The Saints played two Hall of Fame caliber quarterbacks and possibly sent both to retirement in the playoffs.
A 45-14 win over Arizona begat a 31-28 overtime win over Minnesota in the NFC championship game.
It’s All History
There isn’t much history between these two franchises. The first three games came when the Colts were in Baltimore with the last seven coming with them located in Indianapolis.
They don’t play very often, obviously, with them averaging a game every three or so years since 1995.
The last two, which Indianapolis won, were both blowouts. Peyton Manning led the Colts to a 55-21 and 41-10 wins, the latter coming in the season-opener after Indianapolis won the 2006 Super Bowl.
Prior to that, the Saints had won five straight in the series, averaging an advantage of 12.2 points per game. But don’t read too much into that – two wins were decided by three points, one by six in overtime and then two by a combined 49 points.
NFC championship game numbers
As running back Mike Bell once said, you don’t know where you’re going unless you recognize your past.
Well, the Saints immediate past wasn’t something they likely want to remember statistically.
On offense, the 55 plays were the second-fewest run this season, with the 50 in the New England game being the fewest. But the 4.7 yard-per-play average was the second-lowest this season behind the 3.5 in the regular season-finale against Carolina.
New Orleans tied a season-high for penalties with nine and the 88 yards were the third-most this season. And the seven punts were the second-most for New Orleans this season. Against Carolina on Jan. 3, Thomas Morstead punted nine times.
Throw out that Carolina game and the Saints would have had their fewest yards in a game, lowest average per play and most punts in one game.
Defensively, the Saints allowed Minnesota to run 82 plays, the most by any team against New Orleans this season. The 475 yards the Vikings gained were a season-high allowed by the Saints and the 310 yards passing by Brett Favre were second only to Philadelphia’s Kevin Kolb (384 yards).
And the Saints still won.
Regular Season 3's Company (third-down analysis)
197 plays overall of which 54 were runs and 143 were passes. They have averaged 4.54 yards per run and 7.17 yards per pass play.
• Third-and-short (1-2 yards) - 28 runs, 23 first downs; 16 passes, 6 first downs
• Third-and-(3-5) - 10 run, 3 first down; 52 passes, 33 first downs
• Third-and-(6-10) - 8 runs, 2 first downs; 48 passes, 16 first downs
• Third-and-(11-15) - 8 run, 0 first downs; 15 passes, 4 first downs
• Third-and-(16-plus) - 0 runs, 0 first downs; 12 passes, 2 first downs
Postseason 3's Company (third-down analysis)
25 plays overall of which 8 were runs and 17 were passes. They have averaged 1.75 yards per run and 6.53 yards per pass play.
• Third-and-short (1-2 yards) - 5 runs, 2 first downs; 2 passes, 2 first downs
• Third-and-(3-5) - 1 run, 1 first down; 6 passes, 3 first downs
• Third-and-(6-10) - 1 runs, 0 first downs; 7 passes, 2 first downs
• Third-and-(11-15) - 1 run, 0 first downs; 1 passes, 0 first downs
• Third-and-(16-plus) - 0 runs, 0 first downs; 1 passes, 0 first downs
