NFC Championship Preview: Giants vs Packers
Brett Favre by Tom Dahlin/WireImage.com
When the NFL season began, few football fans would have predicted an
NFC Championship game between the Green Bay Packers and the New York Giants. Four months later, one of those teams is about to advance to Super Bowl XLII.
For the Packers and their quarterback,
Brett Favre, it's been a dream season. Less than a year ago, many were speculating that the 38-year-old future Hall of Famer would finally be packing it in. But,
defying all expectations, the Packers ended up with the second-best record in the NFC, and Favre passed
Dan Marino with NFL career records for touchdowns thrown and passing yards. Early criticism that the Packs' offensive approach was unbalanced has been put to rest thanks to the emergence of former backup Ryan Grant, who seemed to come out of nowhere to dominate on the ground in the back half of the season.
As for New York, change has come in fits and spurts. The Giants got off to a slow start, losing their first two games and looking sloppy on offense and positively porous on defense. Quarterback
Eli Manning, whose play has been maddeningly inconsistent since he became a starter in 2004, has seemed to gain confidence throughout the season, learning to manage the game better. "The decision-making is the most overlooked thing in playing quarterback," says Fox analyst
Troy Aikman. "Eli Manning has impressed a lot of people over the last three ballgames." Despite the loss of key personnel due to injury (including tight end
Jeremy Shockey), the Giants have been on a roll, including a close loss to the Patriots in the last week of the regular season.
Sunday's game promises to be a cold one in the frozen tundra of Green Bay, which "will impact the Giants the most," Aikman says. "Eli has acknowledged that the weather is a factor and it will be interesting how the wind is on Sunday at Lambeau Field. If it is blowing, it will be a factor for Brett to some degree as well. We just tend to see Favre play better in those conditions. He has a much longer track record of having done so."
- Nina Hämmerling Smith
The
NFC Championship airs Sunday, Jan. 20, 6:30 pm/ET, on Fox.
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