02/03 — NFL Films among many others painted this NFL championship game in similar stark colors. Today's game would result in either the perfect season or the perfect upset.

The perfect upset it is.

In what many will declare the greatest Super Bowl of all the XLII played, Eli Manning, Plaxico Burress and the New York Giants answered an 80-yard touchdown drive capped by Tom Brady's 6-yard TD pass to Randy Moss with 2:42 to play with their own 83-yard TD march that concluded on Manning's 13-yard scoring strike to Burress with 35 seconds to play to stun NFL observers around the country by ending the Patriots' quest for perfection one game short of 19-0 with their 17-14 triumph.

"We shocked the world but not ourselves," said Giants LB Antonio Pierce.

And that faint popping sounds you hear are the champagne corks the members of the 1972 Miami Dolphins were giddily firing at each other and preserved posterity as the final second ticked off the University of Phoenix Stadium clock.

As coach Don Shula said before the game, "It's tough to do. Nobody's done it before us. Nobody's done it since." And as RB Mercury Morris said, "We live in Perfectville, where the population is 1." And still is, as the Dolphins' 17-0 trumps the Patriots' 18-1.

And the Giants, who insisted they had a lot to prove to all the unbelievers who pegged them as the third-largest underdog in history, became the first six-loss Super Bowl champion since the 1988 San Francisco 49ers and won their NFL-record 11th game away from home against only one road loss.

It was made possible by many plays, but Manning's 13-yard fade pass in the left corner of the end zone to Burress over a stumbling Ellis Hobbs against an all-out New England blitz turned the tables with 35 seconds left.

The play in many ways looked like the Brady throw to Moss past a fallen Corey Webster. That throw capped one of those patented Brady game-winning drives that gave the Pats a 14-10 lead and appeared to have secured their fourth Super Bowl victory in seven years.

But the Giants came back with key plays, including a phenomenal escape from a certain sack by Manning and a circus catch by David Tyree for 32 yards to the Patriots 24 on third-and-5.

"The guys on this team and the run we've made, it's hard to believe, it really is," said Manning, who won this year's MVP award to match big brother Peyton's Pete Rozelle trophy won in last year's Super Bowl for the Colts (Peyton was in a darkened luxury box at the stadium today smiling proudly). "The drive at the end, there were so many clutch plays by so many guys. It's an unbelievable game and an unbelievable feeling."

"This is the greatest feeling in professional sports," said Burress, playing on his year-long sore ankle that had him questionable and not practicing all week until Saturday's walkthrough and backing up his brash tabloid-back-page prediction of a 23-17 Giants win back on Monday. "For us to come out here and win a world championship tonight — nobody gave us a shot. Can somebody give our defense some credit? Them guys were out there playing phenomenal."

All right, Plax, the Big Blue defense played phenomenal. They sacked Brady five times, two by DT Justin Tuck and the last one by rookie backup DT Jay Alford at the Patriots 16 with 19 seconds left. On the next play, third down, Brady rolled to his right and launched a nearly perfect comeback pass — it traveled 67 yards from his hand in the air to Moss at the Giants 20. But Webster atoned for his slippage by staying with Moss and tipping away the ball to prevent a game-tying, overtime-inducing field goal.

When Brady's last pass on fourth down failed to find Moss downfield, one second remained on the clock. Despite that, Patriots coach Bill Belichick left the field. He was in the stadium tunnel when the premature celebrators finally left the field and Manning kneeled down for the last play.

"It was a three-point win — we're usually on the better side of those," said Brady. "Our team is extremely disappointed, Coach Belichick is extremely disappointed. I'm sure it'll be tough to swallow over the coming months."

"We expect to win here," said Tedy Bruschi, the Patriots' classy linebacker. "When you come up short, you have to tip off your hat. They're the world champions. I have to give it up for them."

You can read and hear plenty more quotes, notes and anecdotes on TV, on radio and online the rest of tonight and into tomorrow. Newyorkjets.com's coverage of Super Bowl XLII ends for tonight but will continue one more day with Monday morning's final interviews with winning coach Tom Coughlin and with MVP winner Manning. For now we congratulate the Giants on their great victory and the Patriots on providing the great competition to make Super Bowl XLII a near-perfect NFL experience.