The last time New York City sports fans enjoyed as much good fortune as they did yesterday was February 3, 2008, when a man named David Tyree — who, with his season-ending injury, it seems clear you’ll need not think about again — caught the most ridiculous of all touchdown passes en route to an amazing Giants Super Bowl victory over the undefeated Patriots. That was a pretty great day. Yesterday came close.
Here’s how it went down. First, the Jets played their most complete game of the season — and probably their most complete in several years — with a thorough 47-3 shellacking of the St. Louis Rams. The game wasn’t even as close as the final score indicated; the Jets ran out to a 40-0 halftime lead in what became the biggest victory margin in franchise history. As has been the case lately, Brett Favre wasn’t the reason for the win; even if he’d tossed up five of his signature oh-what-the-hell-let’s-just-try-this heaves, the Rams still wouldn’t have had a shot. This game sets up a rollicking Thursday-night first-place matchup with the hated Patriots.
The early assurance of victory for the Jets allowed us to catch the 3 p.m. tip-off between the Knicks and the Utah Jazz, a team that finished 31 games ahead of our 34th Street twelve last season. The Jazz came to the Garden undefeated — one of only three NBA teams with no losses — likely to make the second half an excellent time for a nap. But Jamal Crawford, who’s starting to look like the star everyone’s been begging for since he entered the NBA, scored 32 points, and the Knicks looked like an real, live basketball team, notching a 107-99 win. The Knicks — the Knicks! — are 4-2, two games over .500 for the first time in four years. Two road matches this week could put a dent in that “sterling” achievement, but, jeez, now the Knicks are actually watchable.
Then, the most important matchup of the day: the Giants’ road game against the Eagles, an opportunity to take a death grip on the NFC East (and perhaps the whole NFC). The Giants’ running game dominated Philadelphia, and despite a late scare, the G-Men went 8-1, still looking vastly superior to the team that won the Super Bowl. The average metro-area sports fan was happier than he’d been since early February. If he was still awake.
