LET'S TALK FOOTBALL - Sweet Sixteen Cinderella Stories

In every NFL postseason, there are always about one or two teams that come out of nowhere and become the loveable underdogs that we root for to get as far as possible. Some of them exceed expectations and go on very deep playoff runs, while others are sent home with their luck running out too quickly. Today, we’re going to take a look at some incredible Cinderella stories in the NFL playoffs that we were proud and inspired to watch since the 2000. Think of it as a “Sweet Sixteen” since there are sixteen that I believe are the most memorable. Let’s jump right in, shall we?

#1: 2001 New England Patriots

While a two-seed in the playoffs is technically not a Cinderella team, nobody expected the New England Patriots to have the run that they had in 2001. Just two games into that season, franchise starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe suffered a vicious hit against the New York Jets that sidelined him for the rest of that season due to internal bleeding that resulted in a sheared blood vessel. At that point, the Patriots were 0-2 and a lot of jobs were going to be on the line if they ended up having another losing season. That included head coach Bill Belichick, who already had a failed stint with the Cleveland Browns, with the same script nearly repeating itself once again. But with backup quarterback Tom Brady taking over, the Patriots found a script that carried them throughout the rest of the year. He might not have been the elite quarterback at the time that made him the GOAT, but Brady held his end of the bargain by just managing the game and not put the football in harm’s way. He also did not have the strongest supporting cast on paper, but they still scored the sixth most points in the league and had incredible chemistry with one another every single week. The biggest reason for their success was their lights-out defense, who gave up the sixth fewest points in football and eighth in takeaways. They had plenty of Hall of Fame talent on that defense including Richard Seymour, Willie McGinest, Mike Vrabel, Tedy Bruschi, and Ty Law that were the key cornerstones of the whole franchise, let alone that 2001 team. New England finished the season 11-5 and clinched the second seed in the AFC, but what they accomplished in the playoffs would be something that we would all be used to for a very long time.

Because they had a first-round bye in the playoffs, the Patriots were fortunate enough to host the Oakland Raiders in the Divisional Round. Their opponent might have had more talent on both sides of the ball, but the game ended up taking place in a snowy blizzard, so there was no excuse for New England to not try to win this game. Down 13-10 in the fourth quarter, all Tom Brady had to do was drive his team into field goal range, so that all-pro kicker Adam Vinatieri can try to send the game into overtime. On first down at the Oakland 42 yard line with 1:50 remaining, future Hall of Fame cornerback Charles Woodson came free on a blitz and knocked the ball out of Brady’s hands before he threw the football. The Raiders picked up the football and it was initially a lost fumble that would have sealed the game. But after a long official review, it was determined that Brady’s arm was going forward and had not tucked the football back into his body, so it was therefore ruled an incomplete pass. Even though it was not the first time that the Tuck Rule had been enforced, it was certainly the one that everybody remembers the most. But it didn’t cost the Raiders the game, it just gave the Patriots more time to get three more points on the board. Sure enough, Brady drove his team into field goal range, and Vinatieri drilled a 45 yard kick through the uprights in the violent snow to send that game into overtime. The Patriots won the coin toss and elected to receive, immediately picking apart that Raiders defense into the redzone, where Vinatieri ended the game with a chip-shot field goal.

For the first time since 1997, the Patriots were in the AFC Championship game, but they had to head on the road to take on the number one seed Pittsburgh Steelers. Even though they didn’t have a lights-out offense themselves, their defense was the main bread and butter, so everybody knew that this game was going to be a dog-fight. However, any hope that New England had before it started was almost ruined after Brady suffered an ankle injury in the second quarter. Drew Bledsoe took over for the rest of the game and played well enough to win, even throwing a touchdown pass to David Patten that put New England up 14-3. But the main hero of that game was Troy Brown, who not only took a 55 yard punt return to the house but whom also lateraled a blocked field goal to Antwan Harris that gave the Patriots a 21-3 lead. The defense took care of the rest by picking off Kordell Stewart three times, and New England was heading to the Super Bowl!

Tom Brady was healthy enough to start in the biggest game of his life, but it wouldn’t have changed the spread, that’s for damn sure. The Patriots were fourteen point underdogs against the St. Louis Rams, who were dubbed the Greatest Show on Turf for a reason. They had one of the best offenses in NFL history with an absolute genius of a head coach and an extremely strong defense that gave up the third fewest yards in the league that season. No media pundit was giving the Patriots a chance to win, but they didn’t care. Their defense set the tone by doing something that not a lot of teams were willing to do against the Rams, which was play extremely physical. Torry Holt and Isaac Bruce were getting hassled and rerouted on almost every route that they were trying to run, Marshall Faulk was not rocking the place with his speed that he was normally known for, and even Kurt Warner was starting to look fragile in the pocket. Through three quarters, the Rams only scored three points and turned the ball over as many times, resulting in all of the seventeen points that New England scored that game. However, once St. Louis played no huddle, they nearly came all the way back and tied it at seventeen with 1:30 left in the fourth quarter.

This is where the legend of Tom Brady was truly born. With John Madden announcing that the Patriots should just kneel the ball and head into overtime, the sixth round pick defied the odds and drove his team into field goal range, with just about seven seconds left on the clock. This was also the moment where Adam Vinatieri truly became recognized for his clutch gene, sending a 48 yard field goal right down the middle to capture the first championship that the Patriots ever won in their history! Nobody could have ever imagined that a small team in Foxboro would beat the most historic offense in the league at the time 20-17 on the biggest stage in sports. Before the Patriots were the evil empire of the National Football League, this team was celebrated across the world for how they were able to knock off the biggest giants at the time. While the St. Louis Rams were never the same team after that Super Bowl, what happened to the Patriots was flat out historic.

Rams receiver Ricky Proehl was right when he said that a dynasty was born on that night of the Super Bowl. It just didn't happen to be the team we all thought it would be at the time. Since Super Bowl 36, the New England Patriots ended up becoming one of the greatest dynasties in the history of the NFL. Tom Brady and Bill Belichick went to eight more Super Bowls together and won five of them. The once backup quarterback that was only a game manager in 2001 ended up breaking nearly every record in the book and established himself as the greatest quarterback that has walked the earth. He won three more regular season MVP’s, four more Super Bowl MVP’s, and even won a seventh Super Bowl when he joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2020. Bill Belichick now has the second most wins out of any NFL Head Coach, just fourteen short of Don Shula at number one. There might have been a lot of turmoil and drama throughout that historic run, but nobody can ever take away from what Brady and Belichick were able to do together, and who knows when we’re going to see something like that again?

#2: 2003 Carolina Panthers

The Carolina Panthers in 2003 had somewhat of a similar story as the Patriots did in 2001, but both teams had totally different endings. They began as an expansion team in 1995 and shocked the world by reaching the NFC Championship in just their second season, but the Panthers have not had a winning record since. Nobody had any expectations for them heading into 2003 with Rodney Peete as the initial starting quarterback, and after trailing 14-0 in their opening game against the Jacksonville Jaguars, head coach John Fox made a bold decision by replacing Peete with backup quarterback Jake Delhomme. Having not had any previous success in the NFL and just returning from playing in Europe, nobody expected anything out of the sixth-year undrafted quarterback. But once Delhomme got his chance to shine, he took his opportunity and absolutely ran away with it throughout the entire way. The Panthers came back to win that game and started the season 5-0, ultimately finishing 11-5 with an NFC South division title, with their underdog quarterback a huge reason why.

But nobody remembers how truly fun and exciting the “Cardiac Cats” were that season. They had a full-fledged rushing attack led by Deshaun Foster and Stephen Davis, a relentless receiving duo featuring Steve Smith and Muhsin Muhammad, and an opportunistic defense mainly captained by future Hall of Fame defensive end Julius Peppers. The reason why they were called the Cardiac Cats is because they were an incredibly resilient team that always found a way to come back from behind, but more importantly, win games in the clutch. Nine out of their eleven wins were by one score, beating quality teams in the process. The Panthers didn’t look like a fourth seed in the playoffs, because any time you gave them any extra momentum, they were going to make you pay.

The Panthers started the playoffs by shutting down the Dallas Cowboys at home, who were also trying to turn things around under new head coach Bill Parcells. Steve Smith set the tone on offense with 135 receiving yards on just five catches, including a 70 yard reception on just the first pass attempt of the game, and the defense took care of the rest by giving up just 204 total yards of offense and ten points. That was pretty much expected against a team without a good quarterback or a strong offense itself, but Carolina showed their Cardiac Cat toughness in the next round against the St. Louis Rams. Although the offensive core was still intact and their defense lead the league in takeaways that season, Kurt Warner was not getting the start at quarterback this time. Instead, it was third-year guy named Marc Bulger that lead St. Louis to a 12-4 record and a first-round bye in the postseason. Carolina was leading 23-12 in the fourth quarter, and after Bulger threw his second interception of the game with just about eight minutes to go, it looked like they were going to win in blowout fashion once again. But that was when things started to unravel. John Kasay missed a 53 yard field goal on the following possession, then the Rams marched down the field in just about four minutes to cut their deficit to three. Instead of putting the defense back on the field, head coach Mike Martz elected to try an onside kick, and the gutsy decision paid off as St. Louis recovered with plenty of time left for Jeff Wilkins to make a chip-shot field goal to send the game into overtime. Both kickers exchanged missed field goals in what was an absolute dogfight at that point, but with a chance to get back into field goal range, Bulger threw his third interception of the night that ended up costing St. Louis the game. At the start of the second overtime period, Delhomme ended the game by finding Steve Smith down the middle of the field, and the trash-talking stud of a receiver took it 69 yards to the house for the win. Carolina was back in the NFC Championship, but this time, they would give their fans a better ending than the one in 1996.

They headed out to Philadelphia and took on the number one seed Eagles, who made their third straight conference championship appearance under head coach Andy Reid and quarterback Donovan McNabb. Even though it was not as heartbreaking and gut-punching as their loss the previous year against Tampa Bay, this one was pretty close. The Panthers did not really need to do too much on offense because the unsung hero of this game came on the defensive side of the ball. Defensive back Ricky Manning, who came up with the sealing interception the previous week, picked off McNabb three times. That ended up being the amount of points that Philadelphia scored as Carolina absolutely shut them down from start to finish. For the first time in the history of the franchise, the Panthers were heading to play in the Super Bowl, but their storybook didn’t get a happy ending.

In the new Arlington Stadium in Houston, the underdog Carolina Panthers were facing off against the New England Patriots, who made their second Super Bowl appearance in three years under Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. New England did not have the strongest offense that season, but they had the best defense in football, so this was going to be Carolina’s biggest challenge by far. However, they were not phased nor afraid of the biggest moments that were ahead of them. The game got off to a really slow start in the first quarter with neither offense able to push the ball down the field, but once they headed into the second, fireworks were launched. Once they finally got into a rhythm, neither defense could slow the other team down, especially Carolina. The Patriots could not keep up with the pace that the Panthers were playing at for the entirety of the night, and after trailing 21-10 in the fourth quarter, they quickly regained the lead thanks to a 33 yard touchdown burst from Deshaun Foster and then an 85 yard breakaway score from Muhsin Muhammad. However, the one issue that the Panthers had all night was that they couldn’t stop Tom Brady. He only made one mistake the entire night, which was throwing a redzone interception to Reggie Howard with a chance to go up by double-digits in the fourth quarter, and that lead to Carolina taking their only lead of the game. But then Brady redeemed himself by retaking the lead with a short touchdown pass to Mike Vrabel, which allowed New England to go up by seven. The Panthers got the ball back and easily scored the game-tying touchdown with a wide open pass to Ricky Proehl in the middle of the endzone. All their defense had to do was prevent the Patriots from getting into field goal range, and at minimum, the game would head into overtime. Unfortunately, that was when their luck ran out. On the ensuing kickoff, John Kasay pushed the ball out of bounds to the right side, allowing New England to start at their own forty yard line. It did not take long for Brady to drive into field goal range, and after missing two previous kicks that night, Adam Vinatieri made his second Super Bowl winning kick of his career. The final score was 32-29 New England, and that game ended up being one of the best Super Bowls in NFL History.

It was an absolutely heartbreaking finish for not just one of the most exciting teams of that 2003 season, but in NFL History. Week after week, they were counted out and always played with a huge chip on their shoulder, but they sure as hell earned their respect even with the defeat. The Panthers would end up getting back to the NFC Championship in 2005 after two impressive victories against the New York Giants and Chicago Bears, but they got blown out by the Seattle Seahawks 34-14 on the road. Three years later, they earned the number two seed and hosted the Arizona Cardinals in the divisional round, before the Panthers suffered another crushing postseason loss. In 2010, Jake Delhomme was traded to the Cleveland Browns and John Fox was fired after a 2-14 season, and Carolina would not make it back to the Super Bowl until 2015 under a totally new regime. This might not have been the greatest Cinderella season in my opinion, but if they had won a championship, they would have been right near the top of the list for sure.

#3: 2005 Pittsburgh Steelers

This Cinderella story is certainly unique because even though they were the best team in the AFC the year before, the Pittsburgh Steelers became the first six seed to ever win a Super Bowl in the 2005 season. It was also the end of a long fourteen-year drought for head coach Bill Cowher, who finally captured the championship ring that he had been chasing since he took the job in 1992. In my opinion, the biggest reason why the Steelers were able to win the championship that year was because for the first time in a long while, they were never given huge expectations to make a very deep run. Before we get to that sensational postseason run, we have to understand how Pittsburgh got here in the first place.

Before the 2005 season started, star running back Jerome Bettis announced that this was going to be his last year in the NFL after months of contemplating and reflecting. In 2004, it looked like destiny was going to be on his side after the Steelers went 15-1 under an aggressive defense and a re-energized offense under the leadership of rookie quarterback Ben Roethlisberger. But after a heartbreaking loss to the New England Patriots in the AFC Championship, it just looked like the curse was going to stay with Pittsburgh for years on end. One year later, the Steelers finished with a respectable 11-5 record, but they entered the AFC playoffs as a sixth seed. Roethlisberger was in his second season and missed four games due to injury, so while he showed incredible flashes at times, he never put together the type of season that made you believe he was a franchise starter at that moment. The offense was mainly spearheaded by second year running back Willie Parker, who eventually became the number one option, and he shined big with a 1200 yard campaign. What made the Steelers strong that season was the same that made them unstoppable the year before: their relentless and impenetrable defense. Under Dick LeBeau, they only gave up the third fewest points in the NFL at just sixteen points a game, with plenty of All-Pro talent on all three levels. It didn’t matter if it was Troy Polamalu, Joey Porter, Clark Haggans, James Farrior, or even Larry Foote. Any time that had to go up against that vicious front was going to be in for a very long and painful afternoon. They were ready to enter that postseason with a vengeance and finally end the curse that has been biting them for years and years.

Their first playoff game was on the road against their division rival Cincinnati Bengals. Even though they did not have a great defense themselves, their offense was electric that featured a bunch of Pro Bowl talent including third year quarterback Carson Palmer and a star-studded receiving duo of Chad Johnson and TJ Houshmandzadeh. The Bengals were the favorites to win that Wild Card game, but after Palmer tore his ACL on just his first pass of the game due to a low hit from Kimo von Oelhoffen, you could hear a pin drop in that stadium. Jon Kitna took over and got off to a promising start, giving Cincinnati an early 17-7 in the middle of the second quarter. However, Pittsburgh tightened up their defense by picking him off twice and sacking him four times, while the offense scored twenty-four unanswered points to win the game by double-digits. Roethlisberger had just five incompletions and threw three touchdown passes, but that would not be his biggest moment during this playoff run.

No sixth seed had ever beaten a number one seed, so the Steelers were given little to no shot against the high-powered Indianapolis Colts with Peyton Manning. Both teams played against each other in the old RCA Dome earlier in that regular season, and the Colts didn’t just win, they completely blew Pittsburgh out of the park. This time around, the game followed a completely different script. The offense was humming, the defense was neutralizing the passing game, and the Steelers were up 21-3 through the first forty-five minutes. Indianapolis ended up scoring on a couple of quick drives to cut their deficit to three points, but a sack from Joey Porter in the final two minutes seemed to seal the deal for Pittsburgh… until chaos erupted. All the Steelers had to do was take as much time off the clock as possible and to not turn the ball over. But sure enough, on the very next play after the Porter sack, Jerome Bettis took a handoff up the middle and fumbled the ball. The Colts picked it up and as Nick Harper tried to sprint his way to the endzone for a touchback, Ben Roethlisberger tripped him up close to midfield and prevented what could have been a humiliating choke job. Even though it was a turnover from Pittsburgh, it was a play that sort of defined the career of Roethlisberger because he was somebody that was always going to make sure that his team was not going to lose that game, and that tackle right there showed the type of heart and dedication that he brought every single week. It was even better that the Steelers defense did not break and forced kicker Mike Vanderjagt to send the game into overtime with a 46 yard field goal attempt. However, Pittsburgh got its miracle delivered with the kick sailing way wide to the right, allowing them to escape with the 21-18 victory. There are so many “What Ifs” with this type of game because with all of the mistakes that the Steelers made down the stretch, the Colts could never capitalize on them, and it came back to bite them in the butt.

Pittsburgh was back in the AFC Championship, but instead of being back home at Heinz Field, they had to travel up to Mile High and face off against another legitimate playoff team in the Denver Broncos. Both teams were very similar heading into this matchup. Their defenses were incredible, the offenses played efficient all season long, and each had outstanding head coaches that either are or should be in the Hall of Fame. This game was flat out ugly from start to finish as the Steelers trampled their opponent on nearly every possession. Although Pittsburgh could not run the ball well at all in this game, Roethlisberger had another sensational performance with three touchdowns scored and 275 passing yards, carrying the offense to score 34 points for the entire afternoon. The objective for the Steelers defense was very simple: shut down the run and make quarterback Jake Plummer beat them. Dick LeBeau came up with an outstanding gameplan and it worked to fruition. Mike Anderson and Tatum Bell combined for just 67 yards on the ground, while Plummer turned the ball over four times in what was just a miserable night for that offense. For the first time in a decade, the Steelers were back in the Super Bowl and this time, they didn’t have Neil O’Donnell sabotaging their chances of winning.

It’s fitting that Jerome Bettis would play his final NFL game in Detroit, the city where he was born and raised before enrolling at the University of Notre Dame. Even though the Steelers were underdogs for the fourth game in a row, everybody knew that they were not going to be phased nor intimidated, especially against the Seattle Seahawks. This team won thirteen games for a reason. They had the MVP in running back Shaun Alexander, the highest-scoring offense in football, and a top ten scoring defense. But if the Steelers were able to overpower three AFC teams that were “vastly superior”, then how could we have expected them to do anything different against this team? However, after three straight remarkable postseason performances, Ben Roethlisberger ended with his worst. He only completed nine passes out of twenty-one attempts with two interceptions and zero touchdown passes. You might read those statistics and think that the Steelers got blown out, but it was the exact opposite? They were able to do just enough to win on offense, large in part thanks to a 75 yard touchdown run from Willie Parker to start the second half, and then topped it off with a touchdown pass from Antwaan Randle El to Hines Ward that put the game completely out of reach. The defense might not have been able to shut down Shaun Alexander, but they did not let him take the game over. Seattle only scored ten points and with Matt Hasselbeck forced to carry the team to victory, he got sacked three times and failed to capitalize in the fourth quarter. Pittsburgh earned their fifth Super Bowl championship in franchise history with a resounding 21-10 victory, and while it was far from pretty, they were more than deserving to finally end some narratives and break their curse.

There was so much to celebrate for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Jerome Bettis walked out on top in his hometown, Ben Roethlisberger became the youngest quarterback to win a Super Bowl, Hines Ward earned the MVP of that game, and Bill Cowher finally got the Super Bowl that had been escaping from him his entire career. It might have been a year overdue, but it was nice to see them finally get over the hump. Cowher retired after the 2006 season and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2019, the type of success that never escaped from the Steelers franchise under new head coach Mike Tomlin. They won another Super Bowl in 2008, reached another in 2010, and Pittsburgh is yet to have a losing season. Ben Roethlisberger retired in 2021 as the franchise leader in passing yards and touchdowns, with more than enough on his resume to earn himself a gold jacket in Canton. Although the Steelers were never a surprise team in the postseason, they were the first sixth seed to ever win a championship, and the way that they fought every single game was more than enough for them to earn their spot as a Cinderella team.

#4: 2006 New Orleans Saints

This is probably the most powerful Cinderella story that is mentioned in this article because this was about more than just a team returning to playoff form, but an entire city regaining their strength and fortitude. In 2005, New Orleans was absolutely devastated by Hurricane Katrina, which ripped an entire community apart from each other. The Saints did not even get to play in the Superdome that year due to damages from the storm, and as a result, they were forced to play their home games in either San Antonio or Baton Rouge. They finished 3-13 that season, head coach Jim Haslett was fired, and their long-time quarterback Aaron Brooks was released. Heading into 2006, the Saints not only needed to get back on track with an entirely new regime, but they had to figure out how to re-instill hope and optimism in their city.

The team did not waste any time at the start of the offseason as they ultimately hired Sean Payton to be their new head coach. An up-and-coming offensive mind that spent a few years in Dallas with Bill Parcells, Payton was going to bring a new attitude and vision that was going to put the Saints back in the right direction. But the biggest move they made was signing free agent quarterback Drew Brees to a six-year contract to be their next face of the franchise. It was certainly a high-risk decision considering that he was coming off of a very serious shoulder injury, but now that he has a team and coach that will fully believe in him, Brees will have all of the confidence in the world to get his career back on track. Now that New Orleans had their coach and quarterback in place, it was time for this team to get off to the biggest fresh start of their lives.

The Saints got off to a promising 2-0 start, but the date that everybody had marked on their calendars was September 25, 2006. Not only were they playing the Atlanta Falcons on Monday Night Football, but it was the first time that the Saints would be back in the Superdome since Hurricane Katrina. It was more than just a home stadium for this team. It was also an icon for the entire city of New Orleans. What many will remember about that game was not the Saints winning, but how it started. After Atlanta went three-and-out on their opening possession, they punted close to their own thirty yard line. Just as punter Michael Koenen tried to kick his foot onto the ball, Saints gunner Steve Gleason exploded off the line of scrimmage and blocked the punt. Rolling its way near the endzone, Curtis DeLoatch scooped it up and took it in for the first touchdown of the night. For close to two minutes straight, the entire Superdome erupted in excitement and glee because that play ended up being the “Rebirth of New Orleans.” The Saints went on to win the game 23-3 and improve to 3-0, but that blocked punt will always be one of the most defining images in the entire history of the city of New Orleans.

Finishing the 2006 season with a 10-6 record and the second seed in the NFC, Sean Payton accomplished what he set out to do faster than even he was expecting. Drew Brees had an awesome comeback season from his shoulder injury, throwing for over 4400 yards and earning a Pro Bowl appearance and first-team All Pro selection. Long-time running back Deuce McAllister had another 1000 yard season to add to his list of accomplishments, but second-overall pick Reggie Bush emerged as one of the best dual running backs in the league and started to have the type of impact that he did when he was at USC. I am pretty sure that nobody knew who Marques Colston and Devery Henderson were before the 2006 season began, but they became the two featured targets of one of the best passing offenses in the league, and that would continue throughout the rest of their tenures with the Saints. Defensively, they were still going through growing pains, but they had a lot of tough-nosed veterans such as Will Smith and Scott Fujita that made sure they avoided any sort of setbacks. Everybody was ecstatic to see New Orleans back in the playoffs, and if they could put it all together at the right moment, they could make some serious noise that will legitimize them in the history books.

Because they were the two-seed in the NFC, they had a first-round bye in the playoffs and got to host a game in the Superdome in the Divisional round. Although the Philadelphia Eagles did not have Donovan McNabb healthy, they were still a respectable offense under backup Jeff Garcia, mainly because it was coached by Andy Reid and they still had a lot of veterans during their peak in the early 2000’s. New Orleans was mainly playing keep-up for the first forty minutes, trailing by as much as eight in the third quarter. However, McAllister and Bush combined for 195 rushing yards, and their ability to control the clock down the stretch was more than enough for the Saints to rally together and finish it strong down the stretch. After their defense gave up a 62 yard touchdown from Brian Westbrook to start the third quarter, they only gave up three more points for the rest of the game, and never let the Eagles take the game over in the fourth. The Saints held on to win 27-24, and for the first time in the history of the franchise, they were moving on to the NFC Championship!

Unfortunately, their phenomenal and moving storybook season came to end at Soldier Field against the Chicago Bears. Their opponent came into this game with the second-highest scoring offense and one of the most dominant defenses in the league, and on both sides of the ball, the Saints were just absolutely overwhelmed and outmatched. The Bears ran the ball down their throats for close to 200 yards, and this was a game where Rex Grossman only threw for 144 yards. Even though Drew Brees and the offense were only down by two early in the third quarter, they made way too many mistakes and did not deserve to win that game. They lost three fumbles, gave up a safety, and all of those turnovers led to fifteen of Chicago’s thirty-nine points. The Saints got blown out 39-14 and they headed back to New Orleans empty-handed.

While the team did not win the championship that season, it is still by far the most moving Cinderella story. With all that they had to overcome both on and off the field, they showed incredible perserverance and never backed down, fighting all the way to the very end. The Saints were finally back on the map and the city of New Orleans had a team that played for more than just a game, but for the entire community. Three years later, the team captured its first ever Super Bowl against Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts. 2009 might have been their ultimate epiphany, but 2006 will always be recognized as the start of something new.

#5: 2007 New York Giants

This honestly might be the best Cinderella story in NFL postseason history. Not only were they a road team in every single game that they played, but they beat superior teams as heavy underdogs, and gave us one of the biggest upsets in sports let alone football. Nobody expected the Giants to pull off what they did in 2007, and in fact, several futures were going to be on the line if this team underachieved that year. They made the playoffs in both ’05 and ’06, but never reached a conference championship. Eli Manning was being viewed as a wannabe version of his older brother Peyton, Tom Coughlin was getting scrutinized week after week due to his demeaning personality and underachieving seasons, and their best player Tiki Barber had retired after the 2006 season. Although we were not expecting the Giants to make any huge noise heading into 2007, everyone in that organization knew that this had to be their best year, or else Manning was going to go elsewhere and Coughlin’s coaching career was going to come to an abrupt end. Another particular storyline to pay attention to was that it was the final year for defensive end Michael Strahan, who actually held out of training camp that season before ultimately deciding that he is going to give it one last go-around. It ended up being the best decision that he ever made.

Things started predictably rocky for the Giants at 0-2, giving up forty-five points to the Dallas Cowboys and thirty-five points to the Green Bay Packers, two teams that New York would ironically see later down the road. But once things started to settle down and adjust, the Giants rattled off six straight wins heading into the bye week that catapulted them near the top of the division. When they returned to the field, they never gave you the impression that they were a Super Bowl contender, just a Wild Card contender that played inconsistent every week. Eli Manning was the biggest reason why. In moments, he would show you tremendous flashes that let you know that he deserves to be a starting quarterback. But then there are those head-scratching plays that remind you he is the younger brother, such as the league-leading twenty interceptions that he threw that season. Entering Week 17, the Giants were 10-5 with a playoff spot locked up. They played against the New England Patriots at home, who were trying to complete the perfect season, something that never happened before. Although New York lost the game 38-35, it ended up being the turning point of their whole season. Their defense might have given up thirty-eight points, but they lead 28-16 at one point in the game, and realized that their front seven was the key to shutting down any top-flight opponent. Their offense saw the type of mismatches that they could exploit against other defenses, and the key to winning was to play their absolute best in the fourth quarter. New York entered the playoffs as the fifth seed in the NFC, and what happened next was nothing more than a fairytale run.

The Giants started the playoffs with a warm and sunny matchup against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers who backed in the playoffs with Jeff Garcia at starting quarterback because the NFC South was a total crap-shoot that season. New York entered that game with seven straight road victories, so it was not going to come to anybody’s surprise that they would pull off this upset. Sure enough, the Giants handled their business with a 24-14 victory, but they knew that they had way bigger challenges ahead.

For the third time that season, they would play the Dallas Cowboys, who clinched the number one seed in the NFC at 13-3. Dallas beat them twice that season, scoring 45 points at Texas Stadium and 31 at the old Giants Stadium, so the Giants defense knew that they had to play their best football of the season. The Cowboys thought that this was going to be an easy cakewalk, which is why quarterback Tony Romo and tight end Jason Witten decided to take their girlfriends to Cabo during their playoff bye week, and it ended up being an instant regret. Amani Toomer set the tone on Eli’s first completion by dodging four Cowboys defenders for a breakaway 52 yard touchdown on the opening possession, letting everybody know that the Giants were not going to get disrespected that day. Although Dallas scored fourteen unanswered points to take the lead, Manning tied the game by just gashing Wade Phillips’ defense in just over thirty seconds. In the second half, the Giants defense gave up three points on the opening drive, and zero since. Brandon Jacobs gave New York the lead to start the fourth quarter and infamously threw the ball viciously at the play clock, but the Cowboys still had plenty of time to regain the lead. On the final possession, Tony Romo had the ball inside field goal range, but R.W. McQuarters iced the game with a game-sealing interception! It was just another addition to the list of postseason failures that Dallas had since their last Super Bowl victory in 1995, and Romo caught so much heat for this defeat that Terrell Owens was sobbing “That’s my quarterback” in his post-game media conference. The Giants pulled off the shocking upset 21-17 and had advanced to the NFC Championship for the first time since 2000. Similarly enough, they would play against a team from the NFC North.

The NFC Championship in January of 2008 was one of the coldest in NFL History. Both the New York Giants and Green Bay Packers were playing at a -23 degree windchill at Lambeau Field, so this game was sure as hell going to be a defensive slugfest. You don’t believe me? Just look up on Google what Tom Coughlin’s face was like during that game and come back to this article whenever you’re ready. This was another revenge matchup for the Giants because when these two teams played against each other in the regular season, Green Bay blew them out 35-13 and Brett Favre threw three touchdown passes against that defense. But if they were able to bottle up an electric Cowboys offense on the road, how would we expect anything different against a future Hall of Famer? Although it took until the second half, for New York’s offense to get a touchdown on the board, it ended up being a career defining performance for wide receiver Plaxico Burress. Lined up against veteran cornerback Al Harris for most of the night, Burress was targeted thirteen times and caught eleven of them for 151 yards, snagging almost every type of throw in his direction. The defense made one ghastly blunder in the second quarter by letting Donald Driver get wide open and run past four defenders for a 90 yard touchdown, but for most of the night, each offense had trouble consistently moving the ball down the field. They would throw their punches, but neither let the game go out of reach. Tied at twenty late in the fourth quarter, the Giants were in position to win the game in regulation with the ball in their hands in the final two minutes. R.W. McQuarters nearly muffed it away on the punt return, but Eli easily drove his team into field goal range and set up a chip-shot kick for Lawrence Tynes. However, he pulled the 36-yard attempt to the left and the game headed into overtime. The Packers won the coin toss and elected to receive, but instead of going right down the field to get points on the board, Favre ended up costing them the game. On his first pass attempt of the period, he tried to throw an out route to Donald Driver on the right side of the field, but cornerback Corey Webster jumped in front of the play and picked off the pass! It ended up being the final throw for Favre in a Packers uniform because a few plays later, Tynes redeemed himself by sending the Giants to the Super Bowl with a winning field goal from 47 yards! The Cinderella story was almost coming to an end, but if you thought those two upsets were impressive and remarkable, just wait until you see what happens in Arizona.

The last time that the Giants were in the Super Bowl was in 2000, when Kerry Collins threw four interceptions against the greatest defense in NFL History, as they got destroyed 34-7. It was also the first Super Bowl that Michael Strahan ever played in, and he knew that they were not going to let something like that ever happen again. In Super Bowl 42, New York had a third and final revenge matchup that they had to prepare for, and it just happened to be the team that beat them in their final regular season game. The New England Patriots entered the game 18-0 with the most dominant offense in NFL History at that point. Tom Brady threw fifty touchdown passes and won league MVP, Randy Moss set an NFL record with twenty-three touchdown receptions, and the defense gave up the fourth fewest yards and points under head coach Bill Belichick. New England scored an average thirty-seven points a game, and the only way to beat this team is to catch them off of their rhythm. Leading up to it, Plaxico Burress let the world know that the Giants were going to pull off the upset and even let them know what the score was going to be: 21-17. When a reporter let Tom Brady know what Burress said, he laughed it off, essentially scoffing at the statement and the Giants themselves. How ironic that Brady was clowning the underdog when he was one not that long ago when he beat the Rams in his first Super Bowl appearance!

The second matchup between these two teams was not the high-scoring fiasco that we saw in Week 17 at Giants Stadium. Actually, it ended up being the exact opposite. There is a reason why Steve Spagnuolo is regarded as one of the best defensive minds in the history of the game, because for sixty minutes, Tom Brady got PUNKED and a little bit exposed. Any time that he dropped back in the pocket, he was getting hit. Brady got sacked five times, lost a fumble, and the Patriots offense scored just seven points in three quarters. Eli Manning, on the other hand, was not that much better with just three points. In the fourth quarter, both defenses were starting to bend a little. David Tyree put the Giants up 10-7 early in the period, and while Brady was still getting pressured on almost every single drop-back, he still did enough to put the Patriots in front with a go-ahead touchdown pass to Randy Moss in the right corner of the endzone. Manning had plenty of time left to give New York the lead, and not only was it the most rewarding drive of his career, it was one of the best in NFL History. But that might not have been the case if Asante Samuel did not drop what would have been the game winning interception with 1:20 left, because right after that, the most impossible play in NFL history took place. On third down and five at their own forty-four yard line, it looked like Eli was going to be sacked by a wall of defenders, but he somehow managed to escape and get out of the pile. A split second later, he threw it up for grabs in the middle of the field, one of the first things that a quarterback is told to never do in any situation. But David Tyree not only caught the ball tog vie the Giants a new set of downs, he snagged it with his hand and his helmet, ripping it away from safety Rodney Harrison in the process. Not too long after that play, the Patriots ran a cover zero blitz inside the redzone, and Manning found a wide open Burress in the endzone to put his team up 17-14! Their defense got one final stop on the very last drive by not letting Brady get past midfield, and the Giants officially pulled off the greatest upset in NFL History!

Like I said earlier, this was the year that New York needed to have their best season for Coughlin and Manning to stay with the team, and they absolutely exceeded their expectations! Eli won his first Super Bowl MVP because of that game-winning drive he miraculously pulled off in the fourth quarter, but the defense deserves more credit than ever for how they were able to dismantle the best offense in the league on the biggest stage to hand them their only loss that year. Michael Strahan ended his career on top and is now a member of the NFL Hall of Fame, widely known as the heart and soul of the Giants throughout his entire career. Coughlin stayed with the team until he resigned at the end of the 2015 season. They were the number one seed in the NFC the very next year in 2008, but they lost to the Philadelphia Eagles in their first postseason game. Three years later, the Giants found their way back in the Super Bowl, but we’ll talk about that later. Now you know why I said that this 2007 team was arguably the best Cinderella team in playoff history. Not only did they back in as a road Wild Card team, but they got the last laugh against teams that had previously torched them in the regular season, and the world celebrated when the Rebel Alliance proved once again to be victorious against the Evil Empire.

#6: 2008 Arizona Cardinals

Just like the 2003 Carolina Panthers, this Cinderella playoff team went from being one of the worst in the NFL to one that was this close to winning their first ever Super Bowl in franchise history. Since they became the Arizona Cardinals in 1994, this team was known for nothing but losing before 2008. They only made the playoffs one time in that entire span, which was the only time they ever had a winning record. In the 2007 offseason, the Cardinals hired their fourth head coach in the last seven years, former Steelers offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt. After a season-ending injury to quarterback Matt Leinart in the fifth game of the season, backup Kurt Warner and did a solid job for them. Although the team finished 8-8, Warner threw twenty-seven touchdowns and seventeen interceptions, unlocking something that was trapped in a box for a long time.

Ever since that stunning loss to the Patriots in Super Bowl 36, his career was heading towards a downward spiral. He broke his finger in 2002, then played so bad the following year that he got benched for third-year quarterback Marc Bulger, who ultimately replaced Warner as the full-time starter moving forward. He was soon released from the St. Louis Rams and signed with the New York Giants in 2004 to be their bridge starter, but that team also had the first overall pick Eli Manning, so it did not take long before Warner was put back on the bench after a skid in the middle of the year. In 2005, he signed with the Arizona Cardinals and it was more of the same story. There were some games where he looked like his old self, and others where he got benched for Leinart and Josh McCown for crying out loud. Heading into 2008, he finished off the previous season strong, but nobody thought that he could pick up where he left off at 37 years old. But with his confidence back and body fully healthy, Warner ended up saving his career that season.

After starting the year 7-3, the Cardinals stumbled down the stretch, but they still managed to win their division at 9-7 and make it into the playoffs as a fourth seed. Besides Warner and a young offensive mind in Ken Whisenhunt, the Cardinals had a lot of promise. The biggest star was fourth year wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, who lead the league in touchdown receptions that year and has proven to be one of the top in his game. Not only was he a shifty route-runner, but he had an incredible catching radius and tremendous body strength, the package that every team wants in a wide receiver. He might not have been the biggest dude on the field, but Fitzgerald ended up being their saving grace at the best possible time. The Cardinals also had two more 1,000 yard receivers on their roster, Anquan Boldin and Steve Breaston, along with a pretty decent running back duo featuring Tim Hightower and Edgerrin James. Altogether, they scored the third most points out of anybody in the league and were a huge sleeper team heading into the playoffs. The only thing that could have held them back was their not-so-good defense. Even though they were one of the top teams in takeaways that season, mainly thanks to rookie Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie and veteran Pro Bowler Adrian Wilson, they were one of the worst scoring units in the league and their pass rush was almost non-existent. If they were to make a very deep run into the playoffs, that side of the ball needed to play their best in the fourth quarter and the offense needed to put a lot of extra weight on their shoulders, which is a high-risk formula that late into the season.

Begin one of the most memorable postseason runs in NFL history. The Cardinals were back home for a Wild Card matchup against the Atlanta Falcons, who also ended a long playoff drought thanks to their rookie quarterback Matt Ryan and first-year head coach Mike Smith. They had the league-leading rusher Michael Turner and a sack machine in John Abraham, but the Cardinals made their opponent look like a fifth seed. Arizona’s offense started off the game with a couple of long strikes to Boldin and Fitzgerald, but Atlanta had a powerful second quarter to take a three point lead heading into halftime, so it was anybody’s game from that point on. But in the second half, the Cardinals defense absolutely rose to the occasion and saved their team from getting bounced out in the first round. On just the second play of the third quarter, Antrel Rolle recovered a botch snap and took it back to the house that gave them a healthy four point lead. Tim Hightower put them up by two scores later in the period, but in the fourth, Arizona essentially put the game on ice with a clutch strip sack in the end zone by Antonio Smith that was later ruled a safety. The Cardinals held on to win the game 30-24, and in the following game in the divisional round, Legend Larry was born.

Their next opponent was the Carolina Panthers, who clinched the second seed in the conference. They were not the flashiest team in the league but they still had Steve Smith and Muhsin Muhammad carrying the passing game, an outstanding running back duo featuring DeAngelo Williams and Jonathan Stewart, and a DPOY-caliber 14.5 sack season from Julius Peppers. They also still had Jake Delhomme as their starting quarterback, but unfortunately, he was at the point of his career when he was costing his team games more than winning them. Sure enough, that was exactly what happened in this playoff matchup. Delhomme threw FIVE interceptions, barely completing 50% of his passes with just 205 passing yards and just one touchdown scored, which was on the first drive of the game. On the other side of the field, without Anquan Boldin, it was time for Larry Fitzgerald to take over. After catching six passes for 101 yards the previous week, Legend Larry torched that Carolina secondary with eight more receptions on thirteen targets, totaling 166 yards and a touchdown. Even though it was not the prettiest game by their standards, Arizona looked like the way better team that day, and they stomped all over Carolina in a 33-13 blowout. But this was not even their most rewarding performance.

Because they beat the number two seed and the one-seed Giants lost their first playoff game, the Arizona Cardinals were extremely fortunate to host their first ever NFC Championship against the Philadelphia Eagles. Although they still had Donovan McNabb and Andy Reid as the two main centerpieces, it was still a way different team than it was in the past. DeSean Jackson was coming onto the scene as one of the most explosive deep threats in football, Brian Westbrook was heading into the twilight of his career, and they had the third best scoring defense in all of football. Arizona got off to a roaring start in the first half and it all started with the legend himself, Larry Fitzgerald. He picked up where he left off in Carolina and finished the game with three touchdowns… in the first half! He finished the game with nine receptions for 152 yards, and at halftime, it looked like the Cardinals were going to blow them out with a 24-6 advantage. However, Philadelphia scored nineteen unanswered points and came all the way back to take a one-point lead with ten minutes left in the fourth quarter. The Cardinals offense kept stalling out and their defense was on the verge of a total collapse, but Kurt Warner led a masterful fourteen play drive that took over eight minutes off of the clock that capped off with a go-ahead touchdown by Tim Hightower and an ensuing two-point conversion by Ben Patrick. The defense made the stop that they needed, and for the first time in their history, the Arizona Cardinals were off to the Super Bowl! Almost the whole world was on their side, especially against their upcoming opponent.

Super Bowl 43 between the Arizona Cardinals and Pittsburgh Steelers will always be recognized as one of the greatest that we have seen ever. First off, it was a revenge game for head coach Ken Whisenhunt, who was the offensive coordinator of the Steelers when they won the championship back in 2005. But although Arizona was the Cinderella team, the Steelers were easily the better team on paper. They had the best defense in the league led by defensive player of the year James Harrison, All-Pro safety Troy Polamalu, unstoppable edge rusher LaMarr Woodley, and lockdown corner Ike Taylor. They were so dominant on all three levels and had bullied teams all season long to carry the Steelers to this point. Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger was heading into his second Super Bowl, and while this offense has not been explosive all season long, they still had a decent amount of talent that always found a way to win in the fourth quarter.

Unfortunately, things did not get off to a great start. Trailing 10-7 with the ball near the goal-line, Arizona had a chance to either tie the game or steal the lead heading into halftime. Instead of trying to run the ball, Kurt Warner tried to force a stick route in the middle of the field to Anquan Boldin, but it got intercepted by James Harrison and returned all the way to the house for a pick-six! Now the Cardinals were down by seven and things were not looking pretty for them. But once they returned to the field, their offense came back to life. Arizona went on a 16-3 run and Larry Fitzgerald gave them their only lead of the night with a 64 yard touchdown reception, taking a short slant route and racing past two defenders to the endzone. However, that left Ben Roethlisberger too much time to keep the game alive. The Cardinals defense had no answers for wide receiver Santonio Holmes on the final drive, and on second down at the six yard line, he took the lead back from Arizona with one of the greatest catches in Super Bowl history. With three defenders trying to track the ball, Roethlisberger fit the ball into a very tight window in the right corner of the endzone, and Holmes secured it just long enough for both of his feet to stay in bounds. Kurt Warner had one last chance to pull off an improbable miracle, but a strip sack from LaMarr Woodley put the game on ice and crushed Arizona’s Super Bowl dreams.

While the Steelers won their sixth Super Bowl in franchise history and continued to be a powerhouse contender, this was just an absolute crushing end to what was a phenomenal run for the Arizona Cardinals. The Cardinals have made just three more playoff appearances since then and have never made it back to a Super Bowl. Kurt Warner eventually retired after the 2009 season, Ken Whisenhunt was fired after a 4-12 campaign in 2012, and Larry Fitzgerald played with thirteen more starting quarterbacks. The one word that I can think of when it comes to this team is revival. Kurt Warner was allowed to get his career back on track and is now in the Hall of Fame because of what he was able to do for two different franchises. Ken Whisenhunt put the Arizona Cardinals back on the map, and while it ended on a very sour note, he helped this team get to their only Super Bowl appearance when the odds were stacked against them. Larry Fitzgerald became the face of the team that this organization needed for a very long time. He is the first person you think of when somebody mentions this team and his remarkable postseason stretch in 2008 is the biggest reason why. While the Cardinals have never been the same team since, many will look back at that team is one of the most uplifting stories that were this close to winning it all.

#7: 2009 New York Jets

Any time somebody says “New York Jets”, several negative connotations surround that team. Who can blame us for how terrible they have been for so long? However, there was a brief respite where the Jets were actually winning football games. In the early 2000’s, they were never the laughingstock of the league nor a Super Bowl contender, just anywhere between an average and below average football team. While they were a pretty decent team at 9-7 in 2008, they fell apart towards the latter end of the season, and the front office needed a brighter vision and new voice that was going to put them back on the map. That image started to change in 2009, when they hired former Ravens defensive coordinator Rex Ryan to be the next head coach. Then some time passed before the Jets drafted USC quarterback Mark Sanchez with the sixth overall pick, somebody that was told to give it one more year at college but felt like he was prepared for the bigger stage.

That 2009 season was the definition of inconsistency for the New York Jets. They began 3-0 that included a home victory against the New England Patriots, but then fell into a long slump with six out of seven losses until late November. The Jets managed to get out of that hole at the right time and won five out of their final six games to back into the playoffs as the the fifth seed in the AFC. Entering the playoffs, they had a lot of upside but some glaring flaws. Sanchez flat out struggled in his rookie season as he threw only twelve touchdown passes to a whopping twenty interceptions, but what helped the Jets offense rebound late in the season was their top-flight rushing attack led by 31 year old veteran Thomas Jones. They did not have a receiver that cracked 1000 yards or more than five touchdown receptions, but they still had plenty of decent talent that could stretch the field. What really carried the Jets however was their defense with so many studs on all three levels. The biggest reason why they were the best scoring unit in the league, in my opinion, was because of their third-year shutdown cornerback Darrelle Revis. Not only did he finish that season with six interceptions, but he always found a way to bottle up the number one receiver, which gave him the famous nickname “Revis Island”. New York also had plenty of capable playmakers like Calvin Pace, Bart Scott, Shaun Ellis, and David Harris that were extremely fundamental to their revamped and reenergized unit. They did not have any expectations heading into the playoffs, yet neither does any Cinderella team.

Although they were a lower seed, the Jets headed into the Wild Card a perfect opportunity to pull off an impressive upset against the Cincinnati Bengals. New York knew that as long as the offense held onto the football, their defense was going to be well-equipped to force a couple of mistakes on their own and find a way to pull ahead in the fourth quarter. Simply put, the Jets were the better team that night. Mark Sanchez might not have thrown for a lot of yards, but he only had three incompletions and managed to throw a sweet 45 yard touchdown pass to Dustin Keller in the second quarter, so he did more than enough to win the game on his part. It was also a breakout game for rookie Shonn Greene, who carried the ball 21 times and totaled 135 yards, and Cincinnati was not expecting him to be the one that would lead their offense to victory. On the other side of the field, Revis got to cover Chad Ochocinco one-on-one for most of the night and allowed him to catch just two passes for 28 yards, while coming up with a huge interception as well. New York handled their business and had a way cleaner game, which was all that they needed to do for them to advance to the Divisional Round.

The Jets then traveled halfway across the country to face off against the 13-3 San Diego Chargers, the second seed in the AFC. This was going to be a very huge challenge because this team was smarter and more disciplined than the Bengals. Phillip Rivers had one of the best seasons of his career with 28 touchdown passes and just nine interceptions, LaDainian Tomlinson was still a touchdown machine in the twilight of his career, and they had one of the best one-two punches in Antonio Gates and Vincent Jackson that each finished with 1,000 yards. Their defense was not exactly dominant, but they still had plenty of Pro Bowl talent like Antonio Cromartie and Eric Weddle that kept their secondary in check, and Shaun Phillips had a team-leading seven sacks that year. This matchup ended up being an intense and slow defensive grudge match, but like the week before, the Jets were aggressive as hell on defense and their offense found a way in the fourth quarter. While they had trouble slowing down Gates and Jackson, three things went right for New York. They shut down the run, they picked off Rivers twice, and Nate Kaeding had another regrettable performance with three missed field goals. All of those mistakes allowed the Jets to take a 17-7 in the fourth quarter and then managing to win the game by three. On a day where Sanchez threw for just 100 yards, Shonn Greene picked up where he left off last week and ran for 128 yards on another twenty-three carries, topping it off with a 53 yard score that gave them that ten-point lead. Now for the first time since 1998, the New York Jets were heading into the AFC Championship, and who knows what the headlines would be if they found off to get that victory in their hands?

This was easily their toughest opponent because now the Jets had to take on the high-powered number one seed Indianapolis Colts. Over the last decade, their offense was the standard of the league. Peyton Manning won his fourth MVP that season, Joseph Addai proved that he was still a productive running back at 26, and both Reggie Wayne and Dallas Clark became the two key cornerstones of that passing attack. They also had the best offensive line in the league by a wide margin because with Manning under center, it only gave up ten sacks throughout the entire regular season! That is ridiculously impressive! Their defense was always overlooked because of the offensive explosion almost every year, but they still had the best pass-rushing duo in the league of Dwight Freeney and Robert Mathis, along with one of the most solid free safeties in Antoine Bethea. This was a juggernaut of a team that the Jets were going up against, so this was not going to come down to their defense, but their rookie quarterback Mark Sanchez putting the team on his back.

Things got off to the right start for the New York Jets in the first half. Not only did their defense keep Manning in check, but Sanchez did what was expected of him, and kept finding ways to punch the ball in the endzone. They entered halftime leading 17-13, and the Jets felt really great about themselves and the type of approach they wanted to take when they came back. Unfortunately, that was when all the fun stopped. The Colts made some solid adjustments during the break, and once they took the lead, the Jets offense was stuck in neutral and just fell apart. It was also a rough day for kicker Jay Feeley, who missed two field goals out of three attempts, a similar type of performance that Nate Kaeding had just a week ago. The Colts scored seventeen unanswered points to win the game 30-17, and the Jets were officially heading back home empty-handed.

This team was easily one of the biggest surprise stories in the league and gave their fans hope for an even brighter and more exciting future. What happened the following year just ended up being their most impressive display of performances.

#8: 2010 New York Jets

Who would have ever thought that the Jets would be in this type of article twice? You might wonder if you are even allowed to do that for a team that had made the playoffs the year prior. But to be fair, some of them never bounce back from the highs that they experienced, and many believed that New York would fall into that type of void. Instead, it ended up being the exact opposite. The Jets knew that they had a good enough roster to make another playoff push, but they needed to add just a few more pieces to really solidify themselves. They signed future Hall of Fame running back LaDainian Tomlinson to a small contract, along with veteran defensive players Jason Taylor and Antonio Cromartie, to give this team a tad more strength and flexibility.

Last year, the Jets played really inconsistent and sloppy throughout most of the regular season, but found their stride late in the year. This time around, they were ten times better. Even though Mark Sanchez was still adjusting to the pace of the NFL, he still had a way better sophomore season and showed more improvement than regression. LaDainian Tomlinson was not stacking touchdowns the way that he did in San Diego, but he still had over 1000 yards from scrimmage, while Shonn Greene served as a reliable secondary back. Braylon Edwards had one of the best seasons of his career, totaling 904 yards on just 53 receptions while catching seven touchdowns. They still had some flaws now and then, but they were clicking more than they did last year, which was going to prove its worth in the playoffs. Their defense was also still one of the most consistent and dominant units in football. Revis and Cromartie became one of the deadliest cornerback tandems in the league, and while their pass rush was not totally explosive, they still feasted off of takeaways that allowed them to pull away from their opponents. The Jets started off the season 5-1, then had a chance to win their division at 9-2, before they ultimately skidded into the playoffs 11-5 as the sixth seed.

The Jets started this playoff run the same way that they ended: a road matchup against the Indianapolis Colts. This time, New York had something to say and they were more pissed than ever to send the fans home in despair. Late in the second quarter, Manning threw a deep 57 yard touchdown pass to Pierre Garcon that gave Indianapolis an early 7-0 lead, and the offense could not get any points on the board in the first thirty minutes. In the second half, not only did the defense tighten up on their adjustments and not give up another touchdown, but the offense ran away with the time of possession. They only had one drive where they didn’t get points on the board, and after trailing by two with forty-five seconds left, Sanchez showed up huge in the clutch by easily marching his team into field goal range. Nick Folk made a chip-shot 32 yard field goal to win the game, and the Jets got the last laugh from last year. But their next victory was even sweeter.

When I say nobody was giving the Jets a chance to win in the Divisional Round, I mean that they were counted out before the game even started. They headed into familiar territory as they took on their division rival New England Patriots, who destroyed the Jets 45-3 the last time that these two teams played in Gillette Stadium. Tom Brady was the first unanimous MVP in NFL History as he lead the Patriots to a 14-2 season with thirty-six touchdowns and just four interceptions thrown, the best TD-to-INT ratio in the league. However, Patriots wide receiver Wes Welker decided to poke the bear by making fun of Rex Ryan’s “foot fetish” that not only got Welker benched to start, but lit a fire with the Jets. On the first drive of the game, their defense set the tone by picking off Brady in field goal range, just when you though that it was going to be another cakewalk for New England. Even though New York could not capitalize off of that mistake, they ended up pulling off one of the most shocking upsets of the modern era. Sanchez arguably had the best game of his career with three touchdown passes against the best scoring defense in the league, while their defense sacked Brady five times and gave up just fourteen points before a garbage-time touchdown drive. It might not have been the most humiliating loss in the history of the Patriots franchise, but it was pretty close. For the second year in a row, the Jets were back in the AFC Championship, and they all knew that this could be their last shot to get over the hump.

If New York wanted to reach the Super Bowl, they needed to get past the Pittsburgh Steelers in Heinz Field. Even though their opponent had the better roster on paper, it did not matter for the Jets since they beat two juggernauts with future Hall of Fame quarterbacks. But winning this game was going to be way easier said than done. Ben Roethlisberger was back in the AFC Championship for the third time in just five years, their offense was powerhoused by Rashard Mendenhall and speedster Mike Wallace, and they had the best defense in all of football with the defensive player of the year Troy Polamalu and a majority of the same supporting cast that won the Super Bowl in 2008. If you told me that Mark Sanchez would finish this game with two touchdown passes and zero interceptions, and that Ben Roethlisberger had the exact opposite stat line, I would say that New York ran away with it in a heartbeat. Well, that was not what happened. The Steelers ran away with the time of possession in the first half with their powerful running attack, and after William Gay came up with a scoop-and-score on a strip sack, they took a commanding 24-3 lead heading into halftime. But when they returned to the field, things were starting to head in the right direction for New York. Their defense did not give up a single point for the rest of the game and came up with a couple of key takeaways, their offense moved the ball more efficiently, and that led the Jets to score sixteen unanswered points to make it a one-possession game. Unfortunately, when the Steelers got the ball in the final two minutes, they never gave it up. They made New York burn all three of their timeouts and one third down conversion later, the Steelers kneeled the ball to run out the clock.

It was a winnable game for the Jets, but that horrendous start in the first half ended up costing them a trip to the Super Bowl. Ever since that crushing defeat, this team went back on a downward spiral. Even though Mark Sanchez had his best statistical season the following year, the Jets went 8-8 and missed the playoffs for the first time in a few years. In 2012, he went back to bottom and made a meme out of himself on Thanksgiving night. We all know what I’m talking about, you can look it up on YouTube. The worse he played, the worse the team became. After suffering a season-ending shoulder injury in 2013, he was released from the Jets and became a journeyman backup throughout the rest of his career. Rex Ryan got fired after a 4-12 season in 2014 and had another brief stint with the Buffalo Bills before he ultimately called it a coaching career. The New York Jets have not been back to the playoffs since that 2010 season and have only had one winning record in that entire span. That two year period was considered the best stretch of football that this organization ever had in their history. Eventually, luck is going to run out, and it ended up coming too quickly for what was a promising comeback story.

#9: 2010 Green Bay Packers

It still blows my mind to this day that it has been nearly fifteen years since Aaron Rodgers won his first and only Super Bowl, when he was in his third year of starting for the Green Bay Packers with not too many big expectations placed on his shoulders. Since Brett Fave departed in 2008, new head coach Mike McCarthy made it clear that Rodgers was going to be the future of the franchise, but we knew that it would take a while for Green Bay to reach their full potential. He started off with a lot of growing pains in a 6-10 season, but showed the type of promise that he had as he threw 28 touchdowns and over 4,000 yards. The following year in 2009, a season where he got sacked a league-high fifty times, he was even better with thirty touchdowns, just seven interceptions, and a trip to the playoffs. Unfortunately, during an overtime period in the Wild Card against the Arizona Cardinals, he got strip sacked on a blitz that got recovered for a touchdown, ending a fun year for the Packers. Entering the 2010 season, everybody knew who the hell Aaron Rodgers was, but nobody was crowning him “MVP” or “Super Bowl champion” just yet.

It was a really back-and-forth year for the Green Bay Packers. They began 2-0, then dropped to 3-3, then rose back up again with four straight victories, before they set themselves back at 8-6 with two games left to go. Rodgers suffered two concussions in that span, but when he returned just in time, he sent them to playoffs with needed victories against the New York Giants and Chicago Bears. The Packers were not just a Wild Card team, but the sixth seed in the NFC, so they needed to have an underdog mentality throughout the entire playoffs. Looking at them that season, they were a huge sleeper team. While their running attack was not exactly the most efficient, their passing game was the main bread-and-butter of their offense. Greg Jennings was always a trusted number one receiving option that totaled over 1200 receiving yards and twelve touchdowns. Jordy Nelson might not have been the security blanket that he would become later in his career, but he was starting to come alive at the right time, and he was going to be needed at the most critical time of the season. Defensively, they gave up the second fewest points in all of football and would rise to the occasion more than their offense at times. They had a future Hall of Fame cornerback in Charles Woodson, a rising star in linebacker Clay Matthews, a ball-hawk in Tramon Williams, and one of the best linebacking duos in the league featuring AJ Hawk and Desmond Bishop. This was before the media slammed head coach Mike McCarthy and defensive coordinator Dom Capers for being bailed out by high-end talent, so it is safe to say 2010 was more of a peaceful season than anything!

Their first playoff game was not going to be easy since they were going up against the Philadelphia Eagles. The Donovan McNabb era might have been over, but Andy Reid was still the head coach, and Michael Vick was having a renaissance of a season after not playing for over three years. They might have had the better team on paper, but the Packers stunned them from start to finish. Rodgers threw three touchdown passes, James Starks had a solid day on the ground with 121 rushing yards, and their defense gave up just one touchdown and sixteen points to one of the highest-scoring offenses in football! The Packers pulled off a surprising road victory in 21-16, with an even bigger challenge ahead since they now had to play against the best team in the NFC in the Divisional Round.

I don’t think anybody thought that the Atlanta Falcons would take the number one seed in the conference that season, but it ended up being one of the best seasons they had in franchise history. Matt Ryan blossomed in his third season with twenty-eight touchdowns and just nine interceptions, Michael Turner was still a Pro Bowl player at 28 years old and finished that season with over 1300 rushing yards and exactly twelve touchdowns, Roddy White had just as much of an impact in the receiving game along with future Hall of Fame tight end Tony Gonzalez. Their defense was ranked fifth in points allowed, led by a thirty-two year old pass rusher named John Abraham who still managed to have double-digit sacks, along with two defensive backs in Brent Grimes and William Moore that each had five interceptions that year. That was what made this upset by the Green Bay Packers even more shocking than the last one. While Atlanta took two early leads in the first half, they surrendered thirty-five unanswered points, which was why they trailed 42-14 near the end of the third quarter. Nobody had any answers for Aaron Rodgers, who had one of the most defining performances of his career. He threw just five incompletions, had over 360 passing yards, and scored four total times against one of the top-ranked defenses in the league. Their defense was just as dominant because not only did they sack Matt Ryan five times and pick him off twice, but they did not let the Falcons even total 200 yards for the entire game! It was a straight-up ass kicking that none of us saw coming, and now the Packers were back in the NFC Championship Game! Not only was their face of the franchise putting the team on his back, but the defense went in his direction and stepped up in the biggest games of their lives! The only team that could stop them was themselves, and as long as they stayed true to themselves, they would have a shot at winning it all.

The Packers had a shot to make it back to the Super Bowl in 2007 in their house against the New York Giants, but Brett Favre threw a dagger of an interception in overtime that cost them the game, and this was the time for Green Bay to redeem themselves. Now they were tasked to take on the Chicago Bears, a team average offense with a few decently talented players, but a rock-solid defense that feasted off turnovers and finished the top ten in both yards and points allowed. They might have been the Monsters of the Midway, but this was also the same team that lost to the Packers not that long ago in the final week of the season, so Green Bay was not going to be phased whatsoever. They got off to a promising start with a quick 14-0 lead before halftime, but their offense struggled to gain any traction or get any points on the board for the rest of the game. Rodgers threw two interceptions, one to Brian Urlacher that was almost taken to the house and that could have given the Packers a crushing loss. But all of the momentum of that game changed when Jay Cutler hurt his knee early in the third quarter, forcing both Todd Collins and Caleb Hanie to try to will the team to victory. Any hope that the Bears had left was squashed with a crushing pick six to BJ Raji in the fourth quarter, and one more icing interception by Sam Shields ended the game with a 21-12 victory for Green Bay.

The Packers were back in the Super Bowl for the first time since January of 1998, when they lost to John Elway and the Denver Broncos. They were eleven point favorites to win that game, and heading into this matchup against the Pittsburgh Steelers, they were surprisingly favored by three to win yet another championship. Through most of the first half, you could see why. Rodgers threw two early touchdown passes, Nick Collins came up with a huge pick six, and Green Bay was up 21-3 with close to two minutes left! Unfortunately, Charles Woodson suffered a collarbone injury in the second quarter and was ruled out for the rest of the game, so the Packers were without one of the biggest heartbeats of the whole team let alone the defense. Pittsburgh soon made it a one-score game with an opening drive touchdown in the second half, but any time the Packers stalled out, the Steelers could not take advantage. The huge turning point of that game was on the first play of the fourth quarter. Close into field goal range, Rashard Mendenhall took a simple handoff up the middle in a short-yardage situation, but Clay Matthews came unblocked and blew the play up. Soon enough, the ball popped out of his hands and the Packers recovered with a chance to pull ahead by double-digit scores. That was when Jordy Nelson took off for a 38 yard catch-and-run all the way to the two yard line, setting up the wide open touchdown pass to Greg Jennings that put the Packers up 28-17. Even though the Steelers did what they could to fight their way back in the game, Green Bay found its offensive groove once again, and their defense had just enough energy to pull off the final stop they needed to win the championship. The Packers held on 31-25 and brought the Lombardi Trophy back to where it all began in Lambeau Field!

Many thought that Aaron Rodgers would dominate the NFC the way that Tom Brady did in the AFC throughout his twenty-year time with the Patriots, but things just did not end up like that at all. After that Super Bowl, Rodgers established himself as not just one of the best quarterbacks of his generation, but of all time. He won four MVP awards, his first coming just a year after that championship season, where he set the in-season record for best passer rating out of any other quarterback. Unfortunately, even though he went to four more NFC Championship games, he has not made it back to another Super Bowl. He was soon traded to the New York Jets in the 2023 offseason, but will still be remembered as arguably the greatest quarterback to wear a Green Bay Packers uniform. Mike McCarthy was with the organization until he was fired in the middle of the 2018 season, before he landed with the Dallas Cowboys a couple of seasons later, still continuing to have a good amount of success with three consecutive 12-5 campaigns. My big reason why the Packers have not been able to make it back to the Super Bowl was because they always lacked one of the key ingredients that they had in that 2010 season. When they won, their defense was playing at an extremely high level and their offense had a future Hall of Fame quarterback that always found a way to win in the biggest moments. Since then, either their defense completely collapsed or the offense could not close the deal in critical situations. That is what happens when your team is given a lot of expectations, and they never had to worry about that before they won that Super Bowl against the Steelers. While they were still incredibly talented on the field, they never really had that championship mentality that all the great teams need to make it back year after year, and it just unfortunately fizzled out.

#10: 2011 Denver Broncos

This is personally my favorite Cinderella story that I ever got to watch in my lifetime, and I am sure that a lot of NFL fans would say the same thing. The 2011 season was considered to be a fresh start for the Denver Broncos. They had just fired their previous head coach Josh McDaniels and replaced him with the trusted veteran known as John Fox, they promoted John Elway to be the head of football operations, and they had an abundance of young talent that was ready to showcase their talents. Nobody expected the Broncos to make the playoffs nor did anyone really think that they would have a winning season. For Fox and Elway, it was a season for them to evaluate their biggest strengths and weaknesses, and build upon them to form a better team the next year.

Unfortunately, things did not get off to a great start. With Kyle Orton as the starting quarterback, they lost four out of their first five games and were near the bottom of the pit at 1-4. In that final loss, John Fox benched Orton for second-year quarterback and man of faith Tim Tebow, who was drafted in the first round by the previous regime in Denver. Down 26-10 in the fourth quarter, the Broncos made a late push to make it a one-score game, but they ended up falling short and lost the game by five points. The fans were clamoring for Tebow to be their full-time starter, and sure enough, he got his chance when they returned from the bye week against the Miami Dolphins. What was next was quite honestly the weirdest winning stretch I have ever seen in my life. Most of the Broncos wins followed nearly the exact same script. Fall behind early, struggle on both sides of the early, but then flip a miracle switch in the fourth quarter to come back and win the game. Although there were serious question marks with Tebow’s ability to throw the football, his athleticism was what gave this offense a needed boost and his ability to win games in the clutch was what saved them from gut-wrenching defeats. The Broncos were 7-4 with Tebow as the starter, and because the AFC West was incredibly weak that season, they did just enough to win the division and clinch a playoff spot. Not only did he lift them up at the best possible time, but the man became a national treasure, and the world flat out embraced him.

While nobody was thinking it at the time, there was a lot of upside with this Broncos team. We already talked about Tebow, but nobody knew just how special his supporting cast would truly become in the future. 2011 was the first year where we got to see Eric Decker and the late Demaryius Thomas establish themselves as a reliable receiving tandem, but their offense was mainly carried by their ground game. Willis McGahee lead the way with close to 1200 rushing yards, and combined with Tebow’s athleticism, their power and strength was what at least got the Broncos to this point late in the year. Defensively, they were a below-average unit, but they had a few capable playmakers as well. Von Miller was the defensive rookie of the year with 11.5 sacks, Champ Bailey was still playing at a high level and continued to lead a young secondary through several in-game adversities, and Elvis Dumervil was having a pro-Bowl caliber 9.5 sack campaign of his own.

The Broncos got off to a slow start, but in the second quarter, their offense started torching that vaunted Pittsburgh Steelers defense. It was not their running game that was their main source of efficiency, but surprisingly the passing game. Tebow was launching deep throws all over the place and most of them became completions more than overthrows or ducks. The Steelers placed their top cornerback Ike Taylor against Denver’s top receiver Demaryius Thomas, and the receiver won the matchup almost every single time. By halftime, the Broncos were up 20-6 and Pittsburgh looked completely discombobulated. However, the Steelers roared all the way back and went on a 17-3 run to force the game into overtime, reminding the world why they were in the Super Bowl the year before. The Broncos won the coin toss and their offense received the ball first. Just one play into the extended period, Tebow threw a dart over the middle of the field to Thomas, and he cleared past three defenders for a walkoff 80 yard touchdown to win the game! The future All-Pro receiver finished that game with 204 receiving yards on just four catches and the score that sent Denver to the divisional round. Although Tebow completed less than 50% of his passes, he made the plays that were needed to win the game once again, which is why he threw for over 300 yards and a pair of touchdowns against the best defense in the league.

Unfortunately, the Broncos saw their season come to an end the following week against the New England Patriots. While this team had a worse defense, they had something that the Steelers did not, which was the best quarterback in NFL history. This game was not even close as the Broncos defense got absolutely gashed on nearly every single drive. Brady threw for 363 yards and six touchdown passes, five of them in the first half! Rob Gronkowski, the most dominant tight end in the league that season, caught three of those scores and totaled 145 yards on ten receptions. Denver’s offense did not look any better and reverted back to what it was at the beginning of the season. Tebow completed just nine out of twenty-six passes, got sacked five times, lost a fumble, and had just thirteen rushing yards. Keep in mind, the Patriots defense was absolutely terrible that season. The Broncos got absolutely annihilated 45-10 in Gillette Stadium and one of the most improbable runs ever came to a close.

After that playoff defeat, John Fox and John Elway saw everything that they needed to see and both began making huge changes. Tim Tebow was traded to the New York Jets and never started another game in the NFL. For as remarkable as his story is and for how great of an athlete he showed he was, the Broncos needed a quarterback that could throw the ball consistently, and future Hall of Famer Peyton Manning was the perfect fit for this team. It was certainly a high-risk signing since he was coming back from several neck surgeries that could have ended his NFL career, but when he did return, it was like he never missed a game in the first place. Denver never finished with less than twelve wins nor did they finish less than second place in their division in the time that Manning played for them. He won Comeback Player of the Year in his first year and they clinched the number one seed in 2012. One season later, he broke the in-season record for passing yards and passing touchdowns, earning him his fifth MVP of his career. John Fox was let go after the 2014 season, but in the following year with Gary Kubiak as head coach, Denver won the Super Bowl against the 15-1 Carolina Panthers, allowing Manning to finish his career on top. But ever since he retired, the Broncos have never found another quarterback that could give them a winning record, let alone take them to the playoffs. While the 2011 season was far from perfect, it is seen as the beginning of one of the best stretches of football that the Broncos had in their franchise history. The first name you think of when you bring that year up is Tim Tebow, and for all the flaws he had as a player, his character and work ethic are two traits gave everybody a sense of hope and renewed optimism.

#11: 2011 New York Giants

When I look back at the 2011 New York Giants, I honestly think it is super similar to how they played in 2007, but it was somehow even more impossible. They were the first team in NFL History to win a Super Bowl with a negative point differential, with both sides of the ball playing incredibly inconsistent almost every single week. What won them nine games was their ability to perform in the clutch and get the job done in the fourth quarter, which ended up was the biggest reason why they won the championship that season. One of the biggest differences from that 2007 season was how the Giants played in that regular season. At the halfway point, they were 6-2 and in prime position to take sole control of their divison. But then they skidded with four straight losses, and New York found themselves 7-7 with the odds stacked up against them. Fortunately, the team did not collapse and won two straight games to close out the year, including a home primetime victory against the Cowboys that gave the Giants first place in the NFC East.

They were obviously not the same team nor were they better than the one that beat the perfect Patriots in the Super Bowl, but both Eli Manning and Tom Coughlin knew that this team had what it took to pull off another miraculous run. Instead of Plaxico Burress and Amani Toomer being the two primary receiving options, it was now second-year sensation Victor Cruz and third-year possession man Hakeem Nicks that were the big focal points of that passing game. Brandon Jacobs was still a dominant power back four years later, but Ahmad Bradshaw helped pick up the slack in the running game and finished with a healthy nine touchdowns in 2011. Their defense was also not the dominant juggernaut that it was when they punked Tom Brady in Glendale, but they still had tremendous playmakers. Jason Pierre-Paul had a DPOY caliber season with 16.5 sacks, Osi Umenyiora and Justin Tuck helped solidify the line with their veteran presence, and Corey Webster was an underrated ball-hawk that finished in the top five with six interceptions. As I said earlier, it was even more impossible for the Giants to win the Super Bowl in 2011 more than it was when they shocked the world four years earlier. But they were “All In” to wear their heart on their sleeves, and their tenacity and will was what propelled them all the way to the finish line.

They started off this Super Bowl run with a Wild Card matchup against another NFC South opponent, but this time it was against the Atlanta Falcons. Since last year’s embarrassing home defeat to the sixth seed Green Bay Packers, they were still a respected team, but just not to the level that we all thought that they played at in the 2010 regular season. They entered that 2011 season with nearly the same roster as the year before, and in the first ever playoff game held at MetLife Stadium, the Falcons got off to a strong start by forcing a safety early in the second quarter. Unfortunately, those two points were the only ones that Atlanta scored that afternoon. The Giants proceeded to shut them down on both sides of the ball and run away with twenty-four unanswered points. Eli threw a healthy three touchdown passes, they totaled 155 more yards on the ground, Hakeem Nicks caught a pair of touchdowns and had 115 receiving yards on six catches, and their defense did not give up a single point throughout the whole game. Once again, the Giants simply handled their business and knew that it was going to get tougher from here, especially since they had to play against the best team in the NFL in the upcoming round.

After their Cinderella run in 2010, the Green Bay Packers picked up where they left off in Dallas and stormed by the rest of the league with a 15-1 season. Aaron Rodgers won his first out of four MVP awards with a record-setting season. He set the in-season record for best passer rating, he threw 45 touchdown passes and just six interceptions, and they had the best offense by far in the NFL. The ironic part with this Packers team was that one year after they won a Super Bowl with one of the best defenses that season, they entered the 2011 playoffs as the worst in all of football! Both the Packers and Giants played against each other earlier in the regular season at MetLife Stadium, where Green Bay’s offense overpowered New York in a thrilling 38-35 victory, but this was eerily like what happened in 2007. Remember when the Packers beat up the Giants in that regular season, only for them to lose at home in the NFC Championship Game to the same team? Pretty similar circumstances if you ask me. But time has passed and both teams were on very different paths four years later, so it was time for history to change once and for all. Sure enough, the Giants did it again. Both kept it close for most of the first half, but when Hakeem Nicks caught a Hail Mary pass in the endzone to put New York up by ten points, it ended up being a completely one-sided contest. Rodgers got sacked four times and turned the ball over twice, with just thirteen points scored until a garbage time touchdown drive late in the fourth quarter. Manning, on the other hand, was flat out terrific. He had one of the most defining performances of his career as he threw for 330 yards and three touchdown passes, outclassing Rodgers in a lob-sided 37-20 victory in Lambeau Field! There was no scapegoat for the Packers fans to point at this time, just the whole team itself. The script from 2007 was starting to rewrite itself because they were back in the NFC Championship, and this time, nobody was taking New York lightly at all.

Now the Giants had to travel halfway across the country to take on the re-energized San Francisco 49ers, just coming off of a thrilling but exhausting 36-32 victory against the New Orleans Saints in the divisional round. Jim Harbaugh was in his first yeas the head coach and transformed quarterback Alex Smith from a bust as the first overall pick to a fully confident franchise star that can take the game over at any moment. Their offense was full of rising talent like Frank Gore, Vernon Davis, and Michael Crabtree that also had one of the strongest lines in all of football. But what really made this team scary in my opinion was their defense. It might have been one of the youngest units in the league, but they all shined bright when they were given the chance. It wasn’t that they even had a standout player because there was so much starpower that swarmed on all three levels. Aldon Smith had a phenomenal rookie season with fourteen sacks, linebacker Patrick Willis still played at an All-Pro level, NaVorro Bowman made 143 tackles and shocked the world in his sophomore season, and both Dashon Goldson and Carlos Rogers led the secondary with six interceptions each. But in like many Cinderella stories we talked about, the better team on paper does not always win.

This was the game where I think all of us realized just how true of a warrior Eli Manning was in his NFL career. Because in a game where he threw for over 300 yards and two touchdown passes, he still got sacked six times and got hit on almost every single drop-back. Not a lot of points were scored in this matchup, but any time one got on the board, the other would find a strong way to respond and it ended up heading into overtime as a result. What ensued was a gutsy defensive struggle, until the 49ers cost themselves a chance to head into the Super Bowl at the end. Kyle Williams, who muffed a punt earlier in the fourth quarter that led to a go-ahead touchdown pass to Mario Manningham, fumbled another punt return and let the ball fall into the hands of the Giants. That set up an easy chip-shot field goal for Lawrence Tynes to win the game, the same kicker that sent the Giants to the Super Bowl in 2007, and the kick was perfect right down the middle both times. For the second time in four seasons, this team was heading back to the Super Bowl as an underdog where nobody gave them any expectations or chances possible, and it was time to repeat the Cinderella ending once again.

It was funny when we found out that Eli had a chance to win a Super Bowl in his brother’s stadium, but that was not the main storyline. Once again, if the Giants were going to win another championship, they would have to get through the New England Patriots. They might not have been the perfect team that they were in 2007, but they were still just as dominant four years later, thanks to the best quarterback-coaching duo in the league. Tom Brady had one of the most dominant seasons of his career with over 5,000 passing yards and close to forty touchdown passes, propelling the Patriots to have the number one seed in the AFC and the third best offense in football. Second-year tight end Rob Gronkowski was having the best season out of any receiver period, setting the in-season record for most receiving yards and touchdowns for a player at his position in NFL History and solidifying himself as the most dominant tight end in the league! They still had the most reliable slot receiver in the game in Wes Welker, a decent running back tandem, and their defense was still in good shape with the best coach in the game calling the shots. But every Patriots fan knew that they were not taking this Giants team too lightly, and if they were to avoid the same outcome as 2007, both sides of the ball could not afford to lapse in the fourth quarter.

Once again, it was a defensive struggle in which both offenses tried throwing a couple jabs but could never pull away. New York got off to an early 9-0 start, but then the Patriots scored seventeen unanswered points to take an eight point lead, including an opening drive touchdown to begin the second half. For the rest of the game, the Giants defense tightened back up and their offense was gaining more and more momentum with each opportunity that they got. The back-breaking play for the Patriots that ended up being the overall turning point came late in the fourth quarter while getting closer into Giants territory. On second down at the New York forty-four yard line, Brady found an open Wes Welker near the middle of the field that looked to be an easy completion. However, as the receiver turned his body around to make the catch, the ball fell out of his hands and onto the turf. Many blame Brady for the type of throw he made that caused the drop, but the coverage that the Giants played would tell you otherwise, so it was really more of a fifty-fifty play than anything. Eli got the ball back, and on the first play of his final drive, he ended up making the best throw that you could have asked for in a Super Bowl. Backed up near his endzone, Manning threw a deep shot down the sideline for Mario Manningham with two defenders chasing, and the ball was placed in the perfect position at the perfect time. It was an even better catch from Manningham, who was able to drag his feet along the sideline to stay in bounds and it ultimately keep the drive alive. The Giants then marched all the way down the field in about three minutes, with a second and goal at the six yard line. New England was going to let them score because they knew that Brady was going to have under a minute to get the ball in the endzone to try to win the game. Ahmad Bradshaw took the handoff, and as he was trying to stop at the one yard line, he accidentally fell into the endzone and the Giants ended up taking a 21-17 lead. Fortunately, the defense did not give up a score on the final drive, and it officially sealed another upset against the Patriots for the second time in four years.

Although many will question if Eli Manning deserves to be in the NFL Hall of Fame, he can make a legitimate argument why he should. Not a lot of quarterbacks can beat Tom Brady and Bill Belichick in two playoff games, let alone two Super Bowls, but Manning succeeded with the ball in his hands in the final minute both times. As much as you want to nit-pick his career, he did what he was asked to do when he got drafted, which was deliver a championship. Eli earned his second Super Bowl MVP because of another clutch game-winning drive, but unfortunately, that would be the last time we would see Manning shine in the postseason. He retired after the 2019 season, just making one playoff appearance in 2016, where the Giants got clobbered by the Packers 38-13 in the Wild Card round. You can like him or hate him, but you have to respect Manning for everything that he did, during both the best and the worst. Tom Coughlin stepped down after the 2015 season, and while he was one of the most hotheaded figures in sports, he proved to be one of the best head coaches in franchise history with two improbable Super Bowl victories. Once again, the NFL world celebrated as another underdog story took down the Evil Empire in Massachusetts. But what many did not realize at the time was that while the Giants quickly faced reality again after that Super Bowl, the Patriots began to reassemble and became the league’s worst nightmare soon thereafter.

#12: 2012 Baltimore Ravens

Some of you might think that this should not be a Cinderella team since they were always one of the most respected organizations in football before they won their second Super Bowl in franchise history. But what some people do not realize was that this would be the last chance for Baltimore to make a deep run with the current core that they had in place. Future Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Lewis, the heart and soul of the franchise, announced that he was retiring at the end of the season just right before they were about to head into their fifth straight postseason appearance. Future Hall of Fame safety Ed Reed was an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season, so if he was going to truly leave Baltimore for another team, this was his last chance to get a Super Bowl ring. It was also a season for quarterback Joe Flacco to shed the narrative that he was just an average quarterback holding the team back from success, so this was his last opportunity to shut all those critics up once and for all.

The Ravens finished the 2012 season with a 10-6 record and won the AFC North for the second year in a row, but they had a tough path to follow as they were the fourth seed in the conference. For a team that fired their offensive coordinator in the middle of the season and that had consistently stumbled, nobody was giving the Ravens a chance to go far, but they shut that narrative down quickly. Their first playoff game was a special one as it would be the final time that Ray Lewis would play at M&T Bank Stadium. Going up against the young and ruthless Indianapolis Colts, Baltimore was expected to win this game with ease. The Colts might have had a sensational rookie quarterback in Andrew Luck and a bunch of scrappy players, but the Ravens were the more experienced team and it showed throughout the entire game. Baltimore blew them out the water 24-9 and they were on to the Divisional Round against the best team in the league that season, the 13-3 Denver Broncos.

In his first year back from a season-ending neck injury, Peyton Manning elevated this team from a Cinderella story in 2011 to one of the most feared teams in the league. Not only did they have the second best offense in the league, but their defense gave up the fourth fewest points and second fewest yards out of anybody else. What took place next between these two teams ended up being one of the most electrifying playoff games in NFL History. It was back-and-forth from start to finish with both offenses shining bright and each defense trying to throw a jab here and there. Denver was up 35-28 with less than a minute remaining before the Ravens pulled off one of the most improbable plays that I have personally ever seen. On third down and three at his own thirty yard line, Flacco heaved a desperation shot down the right side of the field with a couple of Broncos defenders in the area. Somehow someway, it landed over safety Rahim Moore and into the arms of Jacoby Jones, who accelerated into the endzone to tie the game and send it into overtime! In that extended period, both defenses got much-needed stops, but the game was all but decided in the final seconds. Still in his own territory, Manning threw an ice-breaking interception to Corey Graham, and rookie kicker Justin Tucker ended the game not too long after with a 47 yard made field goal. In what was one of the most stress-inducing postseason performances in NFL history, the Baltimore Ravens somehow found a way to keep it alive in the waning seconds, and then rip it away from the Denver Broncos. Baltimore was back in the AFC Championship with some unfinished business to attend.

Just one year ago on that same stage, the Ravens kept it toe-to-toe with the New England Patriots and had a chance to take them down in the fourth quarter. But a dropped touchdown from Lee Evans followed up with a badly missed field goal by Billy Cundiff cost Baltimore the game and were sent home with a crushing 23-20 defeat. Fast forward to January of 2013 and the Ravens are on the same stage in the same stadium going up against the same team. They got off to a really slow start and trailed by six points at halftime, but they came out swinging when the third quarter started and shut the Patriots down. Their defense did not give up a single point for the rest of the game and forced three turnovers, while Flacco took advantage of those mistakes with three touchdown passes and zero giveaways himself. The Ravens got the last laugh from last year and beat the Patriots down 28-13, earning a trip back to the Super Bowl for the first time in over a decade.

The biggest reason why this Super Bowl was going to be pretty exciting to watch was because it would be the first time that two brothers would be going up against each other as head coaches. It was the Harbaugh Bowl between John and Jim, but while one of them was going to brag about this win to their parents, this was seriously anticipated to be a pretty intriguing match. Under Jim Harbaugh, the 49ers became one of the most exciting teams to watch after years of purgatory. After quarterback Alex Smith suffered a concussion in the middle of the season, backup Colin Kaepernick filled in and gave the 49ers offense a completely different identity that took them to new heights thanks to his athleticism. Not to mention the fact that San Francisco had the second best scoring defense in the league with the likes of Aldon Smith, NaVorro Bowman, Patrick Willis, Justin Smith, and others emerging as dangerous playmakers.

When the game began, it did not look like that the 49ers were the better team on paper because the Ravens were blowing them out throughout the first thirty-five minutes. Their offense picked up where they left off in Foxboro and started moving up and down the field on nearly every single possession, while the defense was not giving Kaepernick any room to operate with his arm or legs. After a Super Bowl record 108 yard kickoff return touchdown from Jacoby Jones, the Ravens were up 28-6 in the third quarter and the game looked all but over. However, that was when the lights decided to go out in the New Orleans Superdome, delaying the game for over thirty minutes. When they came back on, so did the San Francisco 49ers and looked like a completely different team. Before you could even blink, they were only down by two points in the fourth quarter, and the Ravens only scored six more points for the rest of the game. San Francisco got the ball back with over four minutes remaining, which was plenty of time for the offense to march their way to the five yard line. The game would be decided on fourth and goal: either the Ravens prevent the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history or the 49ers pull off one of the most exciting finishes ever. The ball is snapped and Baltimore brings a Cover Zero blitz, while Kaepernick lofts a fade to the right of the endzone for Michael Crabtree. Fighting with cornerback Jimmy Smith for the ball, Crabtree could not get to it in time, and San Francisco turned it over on downs. Game over!

This went from being one of the most lob-sided Super Bowls ever to one of the best in the span of three and a half hours. While it was unfortunate that San Francisco couldn’t capitalize at the end, it was at least nice to see the Ravens end their season the right way. Ray Lewis finished his career on top, Ed Reed got the ring that he deserved for so long, but the biggest hero of that postseason run was their quarterback. Not only did Joe Flacco win the Super Bowl MVP, but he went through a four-game postseason stretch where he did not throw a single interception. Instead of costing them another championship, Flacco was the biggest reason why they finished the 2012 season on top, and he got a ridiculous contract extension because of that. However, I was not kidding when I said that this was their last shot. After Lewis retired, the Ravens have still been a respected playoff contender, but have not been back to the Super Bowl. They only went to one more conference championship game, and Flacco was not their quarterback when they reached that point. From 2013 to 2018, he played between mediocre and below average, which ultimately cost him his starting job to rookie Lamar Jackson. Flacco eventually got traded to the Denver Broncos, where he only won two of his eight starts. Since then, he has mainly been a backup or third-string quarterback, but he did lead the Cleveland Browns to the playoffs in the middle of the 2023 season and won the Comeback Player of the Year Award because of that impressive stretch!

Even though it has been over a decade since the Ravens won their last Super Bowl, they did not collapse at all. Lamar Jackson has won two MVP awards since becoming the starting quarterback and the Ravens had the best record in the league last season, so they are in a reasonable position. However, many are waiting for Jackson to do what Flacco did in that 2012 season, and who knows when that time will come?

#13: 2017 Jacksonville Jaguars

Since I have been alive and old enough to watch the NFL, I can safely say that the Jacksonville Jaguars were one of the worst teams that I ever watched growing up. I’m not talking about when Tom Coughlin took an expansion team and led them to some successful seasons with Mark Brunell, Fred Taylor, and Jimmy Smith. I’m also not counting out 2005 and 2007 when they made the playoffs with Jack Del Rio and David Garrard, along with one of my favorite players in the league Maurice Jones-Drew. I am talking about that span between 2008 and 2016, when they were one of the biggest jokes in the league. I don’t need to bring up the terrible hires or the horrible draft picks and free agent signings because that’s not the point.

Let’s talk about how they were viewed heading into the 2017 season. Well, they were coming off of a predictable 3-13 season where they fired their head coach Gus Bradley with two games remaining, and promoted their offensive coordinator Doug Marrone to be the full-time guy moving forward. Quarterback Blake Bortles looked like one of the biggest busts in NFL history, while the rest of the team was flat out trash in general. Nobody was even thinking about the Jaguars having a winning record, let alone making the playoffs, so this 2017 season had to make the list for some of the sweetest Cinderella stories.

The biggest reason for Jacksonville’s improbable run was because of their well-improved defense that was better known as Sacksonville. Not only did they have a scary pass rush, but they had a verocious linebacking corps and a very hungry secondary that prided itself on taking the ball away and forcing the other offense to bottle up inside. The list of names on that defense were flat out incredible. Calais Campbell, Yannick Ngakoue, Malik Jackson, Telvin Smith, Myles Jack, Marcell Dareus, Dante Fowler, Tashaun Gipson, Barry Church, AJ Bouye, and as always Jalen Ramsey were the main key cornerstones of why the Jaguars were one of the most hopeful teams in the league that season. Their offense was now centered with talent, mainly powered by their fourth overall pick in running back Leonard Fournette, but Bortles was starting to show more of the flashes that he had in college than the flaws that he played with in the NFL. For a unit that lost their best wide receiver Allen Robinson to an ACL injury in the first week, they still managed to finish second in points scored and had a couple of rising stars in Keelan Cole and Dede Westbrook that stepped up huge for a team that was given no chance at the beginning of the year. Both sides of the ball played well enough to finish that season with a 10-6 record, winning the AFC South for the first time in the history of the franchise! For the first time in who knows how long, they had a defense that they could rely on to carry them through a deep push, and an offense that could back them up with speed and electricity. Now all that was left was for the playoffs to begin.

Jacksonville had not hosted a playoff game in close to twenty years, so the hype around their Wild Card matchup against the Buffalo Bills was through the roof. To be honest, the Jaguars were the overall better team, but it did not look like that at all. It ended up being a sloppy and ugly defensive slugfest. Don’t get me wrong, the Bills had a scrappy defense and okay offense, but it felt like whomever scored a touchdown first was going to be the winner. It took the Jaguars close to forty-five game minutes for them to get on the board, when Ben Koyack made an impressive toe-drag catch in the back of the endzone to put Jacksonville up 10-3. The Jaguars offense was pathetic for most of the game, but they played better than Buffalo that day. Sacksonville gave up just 148 yards through the air, and in the waning minutes, Jalen Ramsey put the game on ice with a clutch interception to prevent the game from being tied. Simply put, it was an expected victory for the Jaguars that just turned out to be a lot uglier.

Their road journey began with a divisional matchup against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Heinz Field. Jacksonville had not only beaten this team already in that stadium in the fifth week of the regular season, but blew them out 30-9 thanks to a five-interception day from Ben Roethlisberger and a 181 yard performance from Leonard Fournette. Since then, Pittsburgh only lost more game and clinched the second seed with a top five offense and a top ten defense. This was at the height of the “Three B’s” era with Ben Roethlisberger, Le’Veon Bell and Antonio Brown the three focal points of that offense. It was also the rookie season for outside linebacker TJ Watt, who might not have been the gamewrecker that he is now, but it was his first taste of success in an NFL uniform. The Steelers might have been favored to win, but right off the bat, the Jaguars just picked up where they left off in Week 5. The offense ran the ball down their throat and scored on three of their first five possessions, while their defense scored two touchdowns of their own and gave Jacksonville a 28-14 lead heading into halftime. Any time that the Steelers tried to tie the game, either the Sacksonville defense would hold and prevent them from getting into their own territory, or the offense would just respond with another score of their own. It ended up becoming a high-scoring shootout, but that first half performance was too much for the Steelers to overcome, and the Jaguars held on for the 45-42 victory. Jacksonville played with literally nothing to lose and when they amplified as much pressable as possible, Pittsburgh crumbled. They were already having the most successful season in the history of the franchise, but the job was far from over.

I’m sure I said this a bunch of times, but for the Jaguars to get to the ultimate destination, they had to get through the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots in the AFC Championship. In 2017, they were dominating the league as always. They were 13-3 and clinched the number one seed in the conference, with Tom Brady winning his third career MVP. Jacksonville might have been the loveable underdogs with the highest confidence in the world, but this had to be their best game of the season, or else one slip-up would end it all for them. Throughout the first half, they were keeping New England in check on both sides of the ball. Their offense was playing extremely balanced, their defense got multiple stops, and they were up by four heading into the break. In the third quarter, Jacksonville essentially picked up where they left off. Even though they failed to score another touchdown, they were up by ten in the fourth quarter, and their defense was letting the world know that they could beat anybody that stood in their own way. After a lost fumble from Dion Lewis that was nearly recovered for a touchdown by Myles Jack, it looked like Jacksonville was going to steam-roll through the rest of this game in Foxboro. Unfortunately, the offense stalled out for the rest of the fourth quarter and could never put the game away, which gave Tom Brady so much time to just march down the field on two possessions and retake the lead. Blake Bortles took one last shot on fourth and fifteen in New England territory to keep the drive alive and win the game for the Jaguars, but Stephon Gilmore knocked down the bass, and the Patriots ran out the clock to advance to the Super Bowl.

The Jaguars played pretty well to win that AFC Championship, but not well enough. To beat the Patriots, you have to find a way to close the deal in the fourth quarter, and they failed to do that on both sides of the ball. But everyone knew that they would be back in the playoffs and pick up where they left off. With Blake Bortles signed to a big three-year contract extension, the Jaguars got off to a 3-1 start in the 2018 season and got their revenge against New England in the second game of the season! Unfortunately, everything came crashing down.They only won two more games, Bortles ended up getting benched for Cody Kessler, and the offense completely fell apart as Jacksonville went 5-11. Long story short: Bortles was eventually released after 2018, Doug Marrone was fired after a 1-15 season in 2020, and the one-year wonder of Sacksonville was no more. They thought Nick Foles would solve the problem, but he only lasted one season. Urban Meyer was seen as their only hope to return to relevancy, but that was the biggest failure in franchise history. Jacksonville ended up making the playoffs in the 2022 season with Doug Pederson and Trevor Lawrence, but nobody on that 2017 team was on the roster anymore. When nobody gave Jacksonville expectations, every player and coach knew they had the pieces to shock the world, and they did so successfully. The only issue was that when they did get their respect, they grossly underachieved and the franchise collapsed as a result. The issue with most Cinderella stories is that when you bring out the same roster and make little changes, you think you can do what you did last year and everything would be fine, but the team ends up heading in the opposite direction. You have to continue to build around your greatest strengths and know what could hurt you down the road, or else you’re never going to maintain that level of success.

#14: 2017 Philadelphia Eagles

I know what everybody is going to say, especially the Eagles fans. “Why in the world would you think that the number one seed in the NFC was a Cinderella story?” Well, let me put this in perspective for everybody. Through the first thirteen games of the season, the Philadelphia Eagles were nowhere near a Cinderella team. They easily had one of the deepest rosters in the NFL with a top five offense, a top five defense, and their quarterback Carson Wentz playing at an MVP level. Entering their Week 14 matchup against the Los Angeles Rams, the Eagles were 10-2 and it looked like nobody was going to be able to take them down. Unfortunately, all of the optimism that they had was immediately destroyed after Wentz suffered a torn ACL in the third quarter, ending what was the best season of his career. Although Philly won the game and clinched their division, nobody knew what to expect of backup quarterback Nick Foles, which was why many were considering them to be the worst number one seed in NFL History. He at least did enough to win two of their final three games of the season, but heading into the playoffs, they were bigger underdogs than anybody else in the league.

Entering their home divisional matchup against the Atlanta Falcons, the Eagles were the first one seed to not be favored in a playoff game. In some ways, it made sense because the Falcons were the defending NFC champions with the same roster that took that team to the Super Bowl, but it was time for Philadelphia to write their own story. This ended up being a very boring and ugly defensive game where neither offense played their best, but the Eagles were more aggressive and physical. The Falcons could not score any points in the second half, and with a chance to win the game on fourth and goal, Julio Jones let the ball slip out of his hands in the back of the endzone. Philly was not doing too much either, but they at least got into field goal range on back-to-back possessions and get six points on the board themselves. The Eagles held on at home 15-10, but throughout the next two weeks, they ended up playing their best football of the season.

The NFC Championship was a very unique one because it was one of the rare occasions where two backup quarterbacks were starting in one of the biggest games of their lives, and that had done enough to get their teams to this point. The Minnesota Vikings were just one week removed from the Minneapolis Miracle, where safety Marcus Williams missed a horrible tackle on Stefon Diggs and let him break free for a game-winning touchdown in the final seconds to give Minnesota the victory. We were all expecting the Eagles and Saints to be in this year’s conference championship game, but the Vikings were no slouches. Case Keenum stepped up huge and helped lead the organization to have one of the best seasons in their history. He was more of a short-term solution than anything, but he still posted up some of the strongest numbers of his career, and he had an abundance of talent to help him achieve those milestones. They had the league’s second best rushing game featuring Latavius Murray and Jerick McKinnon, an up-and-coming powerful receiving duo of Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs, and they had a reliable security blanket in Kyle Rudolph. Their defense was even better, who gave up the fewest points and yards out of anybody else in the league. This was heavily anticipated as one of the biggest grudge matches of the season, but the Eagles shut down that notion in a hurry. After the Vikings got a quick touchdown on their opening drive, everything became lob-sided with a pick-six from Eagles defensive back Patrick Robinson on the very next possession. Once the game was tied at seven, Philadelphia rattled off thirty-one unanswered points and completely blew the Vikings out of the water. Nick Foles ended up having one of the best games of his career, throwing for over 350 yards with three touchdown passes and zero interceptions, just absolutely carving up what was supposed to be the best defense in the NFL that season. Keenum was unfortunately exposed as a backup and turned the ball over three times. The Eagles won convincingly 38-7 and were ironically heading out to Minnesota to play in Super Bowl 52! But their underdog status was still not stripped from them.

This championship was a rematch of Super Bowl 39 between the Philadelphia Eagles and New England Patriots. Obviously, both teams were incredibly different in 2004 then they were in 2017, but the storylines were not entirely different. You had two of the most dominant teams in the league that season going up against each other, two of the best coaches in the league on opposite sides of the field, but we all know who the better quarterback was heading into this matchup. It was too hard to say that the Patriots were going to just take care of business and repeat as Super Bowl champions because the Eagles played with a quicker pace and more confidence, so this was going to be a game where it truly came down to the wire.

Instead of Nick Foles getting exposed and punked, he picked up where he left off two weeks ago and started shredding that Bill Belichick coached defense to pieces. The Eagles offense only punted the ball one time, and while they did turn it over once, they were flat out unstoppable the whole night. On their final drive of the first half, they let the world know that they were not playing around when Doug Pederson called the Philly Special on fourth and goal at the one yard line. Even though the play was not that crazy, a simple reverse pass from Trey Burton to a wide open Foles in the endzone, what made it so special was the circumstances that they were under when the play was called. The Eagles offense took the field ten times and scored points on eight of them! Foles threw for 373 yards and three touchdown passes, they ran for an extra 164, and scored 41 total points! They were the biggest reasons why they won that football game, and if they played just a bit worse, they were not going to win with how their defense played that night.

It’s no surprise that Tom Brady always saves his best games for the playoffs, but in that Super Bowl against the Eagles, he was literally doing everything he could to try to keep the Patriots alive and win them another championship. Even though they had a slow first half, they were firing on all cylinders when the third quarter started, and he even gave them their only lead of the game with close to nine minutes remaining. If you told me that Brady was going to finish that Super Bowl with over 500 passing yards and three touchdown passes, three receivers were going to have over 100 yards, and that the Patriots would score thirty-three points, I would say that New England would have won! But that just did not happen. Not only was their defense getting carved up on almost every single drive, but with a chance to win the game down by five points, Brady got strip sacked by Brandon Graham in field goal range with the Eagles recovering the ball. Philadelphia shocked the world and became just the second team to beat Tom Brady and Bill Belichick in a Super Bowl, and better yet, with a backup quarterback.

Nick Foles deservedly won the MVP of that game because of how phenomenal he was, but most importantly, the Eagles won a championship when nobody was giving them any chance or optimism beforehand. Center Jason Kelce said it best himself during that parade speech when “hungry dogs run faster” because out of all of the teams that were trying to win a championship, nobody had the desire or the urge to steal it from the rest of the league more than the Philadelphia Eagles. Players and coaches from that Super Bowl victory have come and gone, but it was not like the organization disintegrated and fell apart.

In 2018, they made it back to the playoffs in very similar circumstances. Carson Wentz suffered a season-ending back injury late in the season and once again, Nick Foles was asked to carry them home in the final stretch. Unfortunately, in the final minute of their divisional matchup against the New Orleans Saints, Alshon Jeffery dropped a wide open pass that got intercepted by cornerback Marshon Lattimore to end the game 20-14. After that season, Foles signed a ridiculous contract with the Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Eagles soon gave Wentz a contract extension for four years. He did not even last two full seasons due to both injuries and inefficient play, ultimately getting benched for rookie quarterback Jalen Hurts in 2020. Doug Pederson was fired after that season, but since then, the Eagles were respectable once again. They made the playoffs in three straight years with new head coach Nick Sirianni, including a Super Bowl appearance in 2022, before they lost to the Kansas City Chiefs in heartbreaking fashion.

This is the only time that I am ever going to pronounce a one seed as a Cinderella story because when their face of the franchise suffered that torn ACL, nobody was crowning them NFC Champions anymore. Nobody expected Nick Foles to put on the superhero cape and lead their team to a championship, especially against the most dominant dynasty in NFL History. It didn’t matter how stacked their roster was because Foles was nowhere near the type of quarterback that Carson Wentz was at the time. However, the Eagles defied all of the odds and earned their first Lombardi trophy in the history of the franchise.

#15: 2019 Tennessee Titans

There haven’t been too many Cinderella seasons where a team has been able to turn things around after a terrible start, but the Tennessee Titans did exactly that in 2019. Mike Vrabel was in his second year as the head coach, and while they were always a competitive team in the last few seasons, they never had their quarterback situation resolved. Marcus Mariota always showed flashes as a former second overall pick, such as the 2017 season when he led Tennessee to their first playoff victory in close to fifteen years against the Kansas City Chiefs, he was incredibly inconsistent and never progressed into a franchise quarterback. In 2019, the Titans started off 2-4 and Vrabel was not going to let his team underachieve once again with the type of roster that they had. That was when he made the bold decision by benching Mariota for the rest of the season and move forward with backup Ryan Tannehill, who was trying to get his career back on track at that point.

A former first round pick in 2012, Tannehill was more or less the same type of player as Mariota. There were games where he showed incredible promise, but ever since he suffered back-to-back season ending knee injuries in 2016 and 2017, Tannehill never got the Miami Dolphins over the hump the way he was supposed to when he got the call. But signing with Tennessee ended up being the best decision of his life, because the minute that he got his shot, the team took off and soared. The Titans were 7-3 with Tannehill under center, where he threw twenty-two touchdowns and just six interceptions, earning him the Comeback Player of the Year Award for that season. But it was not just him that took his game to a whole different level. Running back Derrick Henry showed improvement and positive development in his first three seasons, but 2019 was when he really broke out as the best in all of football. He lead all running backs in both rushing yards and rushing touchdowns, soon becoming their true face of the franchise. AJ Brown surprised everybody in his rookie season with over 1000 receiving yards, Corey Davis was a reliable second option, and even Jonnu Smith was starting to become a favorite target. Their defense might not have been a top ten unit, but they had a bunch of playmakers that could stun a lot of their opponents. Kevin Byard and Logan Ryan were ball-hawks in the secondary, Harold Landry broke out in his second season with nine sacks, and this was in a season where not a lot of people knew who Jeffery Simmons was at the time. Tennessee backed into the playoffs as the sixth seed in the AFC, but they had one of the most underrated postseason runs in the modern era, even though they could not end their story the right way.

Mike Vrabel headed into familiar territory in his first playoff game as a head coach because the Titans were set to take on the defending Super Bowl champion New England Patriots. Vrabel knows all and well what it took for that team to become one of the biggest dynasties in the league, but little did we all know that he would be a part of the final chapter of one of the most dominant runs we have ever seen in sports. What people won’t really talk about, however, was the coming-alive party for King Henry. If you told me that Ryan Tannehill would only complete eight passes, I would say that Tennessee would have gotten destroyed. But the gameplan for the Titans was simple: just run the ball down New England’s throats. Henry carried the ball 34 times and was impossible to tackle the entire night as he accumulated 182 of their 272 total yards of offense. Their defense was just as dominant, holding the Patriots offense to just thirteen points, zero in the second half. Logan Ryan, who was drafted by New England in 2013, iced the game with a pick-six in the final seconds of the game and Tennessee slammed the book shut 20-13. That turnover ended up being the final pass that Tom Brady would throw as a New England Patriot, and ever since then, it has been a slow and painful death for that franchise. As for the Titans, they had another week to live for, but their next opponent was gping to be even more challenging and impossible to defeat.

The sixth seed always goes up against the best team in the conference in the Divisional Round, and the Baltimore Ravens were the definition of dominant that season. They entered that game on a twelve-game winning streak, mainly thanks to their quarterback Lamar Jackson, who became just the second unanimous MVP in NFL History. In his rookie season, he showed flashes and potential. This time around, he proved that he was one of the top quarterbacks in the league. He accumulated 4,000 total yards from scrimmage and scored 43 touchdowns, including 1,206 on the ground and thirty-six scores through the air. He was mainly the reason why the Ravens had the best rushing attack in the league, but they also had a solid running-back tandem featuring Mark Ingram and Gus Edwards as well. Their receiving group was not the strongest arsenal, but tight end Mark Andrews blossomed in his sophomore season and Hollywood Brown had a promising rookie year, so they were never a one-dimensional unit. Their defense was just as dominant and powerful. They gave up the third fewest points, the fourth fewest yards, and they were a top ten team in takeaways. Even though their defensive line had a couple of patches, this was not a defense that was going to be a weak link. Marlon Humphrey was more than shutdown number one corner, he was also a guy that was going to punch the ball out and force other opponents to set themselves back. They traded for Marcus Peters in the middle of the season to give Humphrey a solid complement, and right off the bat, he had an instant impact with two pick-sixes and filled his role nicely. A lot of people thought that with a two week break, the Ravens were going to pick up where they left off, but this is when everything got exposed.

The Titans picked up where they left off in New England and used the exact same gameplan: not rely so much on the passing game and put the ball in the hands of the best player on the field. Derrick Henry was once again a superstar and wore the crown proudly. Safety Earl Thomas poked the bear a little by saying that the Patriots did not seem interested in tackling the All-Pro running back, but on thirty carries given to Henry, the Ravens defense gave up 195 yards. On one of those carries, Thomas got stiff-armed twice as the King picked up an easy first down. Not only that, but Henry also jumped in the air and threw a touchdown pass in the middle of the third quarter, a simple play called “Tebow” that swung the entire momentum of the game. Lamar Jackson might have had over 500 yards of scrimmage, but the Ravens only scored twelve points for the entire game. Once again, Ryan Tannehill did not have to do anything whatsoever as Tennessee dog-piled them 28-12 in a shocking upset! The Titans were on to the AFC Championship, but unfortunately, that was when all the euphoria started to wash away.

Their last stop was in Arrowhead Stadium to face off against the Kansas City Chiefs, who were essentially the most feared team in the league at one point. Although they came up short in the AFC Championship last year against Tom Brady and the New England Patriots, everybody recognized that reigning MVP Patrick Mahomes was going to be the face of the league and that he would be the quarterback to beat for the next decade or so. In 2019, the offense picked up where they left off and started torching defenses week after week. That’s what happens when you have one of the strongest offensive minds in NFL history in Andy Reid, the best receiving duo featuring Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce, along with an entire offense just filled with speed and elusiveness. Their defense was also so much better in 2019 than what it was the year before mainly because of Steve Spagnuolo taking over plus they were able to get more starpower. Chris Jones was slowly emerging as one of the best defensive tackles in the game, Tyrann Mathieu was extra reinforcement for a secondary that was flat out pathetic the year before, and Frank Clark became a versatile edge rusher that found a way to close games in the end.

Even though the Titans got off to a fast 17-7 start by the middle of the second quarter, their defense found no answers for Patrick Mahomes and when they could not rely on Derrick Henry to bail them out once again, Ryan Tannehill could not put the team on his back to win the game. The Chiefs went on a 28-6 run from that point on, and the Titans unfortunately saw their season come to an end. As I look back on this playoff run, I think it is easy to see why Tennessee reached the AFC Championship. The Patriots had a weak run defense in 2019 and their offense was even more pitiful since they had no quality receivers or a strong running game, whereas the Ravens were forced to run the ball and did not have the strongest linebacker depth in the league as well. The Chiefs had both the offensive firepower and the defensive discipline to beat the Titans at their own game, and two weeks later, they were crowned Super Bowl champions.

Tennessee, on the other hand, fell into a slow and sad spiral. The Titans made it back to the playoffs and got to host a playoff game in the Wild Card, but the Baltimore Ravens got their revenge from last year and sent them home with a 20-13 upset win. In 2021, they earned the number one seed in the AFC and had a divisional matchup against the Cincinnati Bengals, but a three-interception day from Tannehill cost them the game and they lost on a walk off field goal. Fast forward to the 2024 season and they are a team in a rebuilding phase. Mike Vrabel got fired, Ryan Tannehill was let go as a free agent, and Derrick Henry ironically signed with the Ravens to a two-year contract. It was a very sad end to what was shaping up to be a promising era for the Tennessee Titans, but once they found out that Tannehill was not going to be a long-term solution, the team held themselves back from any sort of improvement or progression.

#16: 2022 Jacksonville Jaguars

I was struggling to determine who my last Cinderella team should have been, and there were some that had compelling stories. Just last year, the Houston Texans with rookie quarterback CJ Stroud returned to a fully rebuilt contender, and the Green Bay Packers found yet another successful one of their own in Jordan Love that came this close to taking down the juggernaut San Francisco 49ers. One season prior to that, the Giants under head coach Brian Daboll and quarterback Daniel Jones shocked the world by making it back to the playoffs and taking down the third seed in the NFC. But in my opinion, I do not think that any of those three teams were as surprising or more heartwarming as the 2022 Jacksonville Jaguars. Allow me to explain.

Let’s rewind it back to the 2021 season, where the Jaguars were just one of the biggest jokes in the league. Long story short, Urban Meyer proved to be the worst head coach in NFL History for a plethora of reasons, which is why they finished with a dismal 3-14 record. It might have been two more wins than their previous 1-15 campaign in 2020, but there was so much that made the Jaguars just an unattractive destination team. The good news was that Jacksonville found a way better head coach in Doug Pederson that could lead this team back in the right direction, just as he did in Philadelphia when he lead them to a Super Bowl championship in his second year.

While nobody was expecting the Jaguars to do anything in 2022, they had an abundance of talent that could propel them back into relevancy. Quarterback Trevor Lawrence had an abysmal rookie season, but now that he has a more promising head coach and offensive mind to develop him, he was expected to take a bigger leap in his second year. The supporting cast around him was just as formidable and promising. While Travis Etienne was coming off of a season-ending Lisfranc injury, he was an explosive player coming out of Clemson, and what made it better was that he has always had a strong connection with his quarterback. The receiver room instantly got better that offseason with the additions of Christian Kirk, Zay Jones, and even Evan Engram to give that Jacksonville offense even more firepower. The defense had never been the same since they took the league by storm in 2017, and by 2022, nobody from that Sacksonville unit was on the team anymore. However, they still had plenty of talent and capable playmakers that could at least make a name for themselves. They drafted Travon Walker with their first overall pick to complement a rising star in Josh Allen, they signed middle Foyesade Oluokon and drafted Devin Lloyd to beef up the linebacker room, and they acquired Darious Williams and Rayshawn Jenkins to bring some more speed in the secondary. As I said, this team was not expected to be a huge contender, but they were at least going to be ten times better than what they were over the last two seasons.

At the midway point of the season, the Jaguars were not even close to becoming a Wild Card contender. They were 4-8 with an average offense and a below-average defense, the Tennessee Titans were in sole first place of the AFC South, and the odds were impossible especially in such a stacked AFC. But all of a sudden, not only did the Titans collapse with a seven-game losing streak, but the Jaguars kept rising and rising with victory after victory. They beat Tennessee twice, both on the road and in their final game of the season at home to stun the world and win the AFC South! The Jaguars won five straight and entered the playoffs with a 9-8 record, successfully pulling off one of the most impossible turnarounds in NFL History!

Jacksonville got to host another playoff game for the second time in five years, and once again, this looked to be a winnable one for them as they got to take on the Los Angeles Chargers. Earlier in the regular season, the Jaguars had blown them out in So-Fi Stadium 38-10, and the circumstances were more or less the same for both teams. While LA technically had more talent and the better quarterback, Jacksonville played better as a TEAM and their chemistry was going to carry them through any highs and lows that they could experience. Let’s just say that in the first half, it was nothing but the latter for the Jaguars. Trevor Lawrence threw four interceptions in that period alone, three of them to Asante Samuel Jr., and the Chargers took a commanding 27-0 lead. But after the Jaguars at least salvaged themselves some dignity with a touchdown drive to end the first half, I had a feeling that Jacksonville was going to come back and win the game. If you looked at that period, their offense had no problems moving the ball down the field and their defense did whatever they could to keep them out of the endzone. All they had to do was stop shooting themselves in the foot with turnovers and they could do just enough to win!

Sure enough, it was an entirely different story in the second half. After throwing four picks in the first thirty minutes, Lawrence threw just as many touchdowns to come all the way back and win the game! On drive after drive, the Jaguars were marching up and down the field and torched a very vulnerable and suspect Chargers defense that was ripe for exposure. Justin Herbert and the LA offense only scored three more points for the rest of the game, and whenever the game was theirs for them to put away, they consistently stalled out in a short period of time. Jacksonville went on a 24-3 run in the second half and won the game off of a walk off field goal from Riley Patterson, advancing to the Divisional Round after it looked like their season was going to come to an abrupt end.

However, the ecstasy from that game appeared to be too much for the Jaguars as they saw their season come to an end the following week against the Kansas City Chiefs. Even with Patrick Mahomes playing on one ankle due to a very serious sprain, the Jaguars were constantly picked apart on defense, and their offense made too many mistakes that set themselves back even further. Costly drops, gut-wrenching turnovers, and a 98 yard touchdown drive led by backup Chad Henne were just too much for the Jaguars to overcome as they fell to the Chiefs 27-20. Kansas City eventually won the Super Bowl that season, so it did sting a little for the Jaguars, but there was absolutely nothing to be ashamed about at all.

Nobody expected Jacksonville to be back in the playoffs, let alone run the table at 4-8 to back their way in and pull off one of the biggest comebacks in NFL History! They went from a forgotten team rebuilding to a legitimate contender, and many though that they would be even better in 2023! The Jaguars started off that season 8-3 and it looked like they were going to ease their way back into the playoffs, before they ultimately did what the Titans did the year before, which was collapse and find themselves eliminated. What makes it even worse is that they are no longer even the second best team in their division right now. The Houston Texans are now extremely dangerous with a revamped defense and loaded offense, the Tennessee Titans have reloaded on both sides of the ball, and the Indianapolis Colts also overachieved and were a drop away from making the playoffs themselves. The Jaguars might still have an incredible amount of talent and solid coaching, so there is a lot of time for them to change the narrative, but things are looking bleak for them once again.

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