NEW ORLEANS -- And may we now dispense with the notion that resting starters with playoff seeding that is already assured compromises the integrity of the game?
May we now cease any debate that starters should play in meaningless games, risk injury, and be deprived of a physical and mental hiatus in order to simply go through the motions in defeat?
How important was homefield and a first round by to three of the four teams who had them? Both the top-seeded Saints and the Colts along with the second-seeded Vikings playing at home with a week off to rest and prepare won one-sidedly.
The Saints and the Vikings - the one and two seeds in the NFC - were both playing at home after a week off. And yet given the way that they had finished the season in unimpressive fashion with the Vikings losing two of their last three to sub.500 teams and the Saints losing their last three, the fans of those two teams were probably the most nervous of the eight teams playing over the weekend, given the impressive way their opponents in the Cardinals and the Cowboys had won the previous week.
And yet the combination of rest and relaxation, preparation and proximity, home field and home cooking produced the two most dominant victories of the weekend. The Saints and the Vikings won by 31 points each - by a combined score of 79-17.
Now the fans of both the Vikings and the Saints are reassured that their teams have cast aside recent problems and have restored previous prosperity.
The fans of one will have that notion reinforced next Sunday in victory. The fans of the other will have that notion shattered in defeat.
For those of you lucky enough to be a part of history, to be in the Superdome for the first NFC championship game the Saints have ever hosted for their first Super Bowl berth in franchise history, nothing is guaranteed for you on the field.
But for the Saints on the field, one thing can be guaranteed by you in the stands. They can promise you nothing, but you can promise them something: the most raucous, enthusiastic, intimidating, sustained atmosphere any visitor has ever experienced in NFC championship game history.
On the road to the promised land in Miami, it's a promise you can keep. And if in doing your part the Saints are even more inspired to do theirs, you will share in the historic accomplishment when they do.
