Case for defence based on the stark beauty of winning records

By ROB LONGLEY -- Toronto Sun
  TAMPA -- Maybe they are products of parity, pre-season pretenders that have made it to the NFL's big game.

 So go ahead and label tonight's Super Bowl XXXV at Raymond James Stadium the Super Bore before it even kicks off.

 But don't say the NFC champion New York Giants and AFC champion Baltimore Ravens don't belong on the biggest single-game stage in American sports.

 17 IN A ROW

 Between them, they've won 17 consecutive games, dominating journeys that have seen defences triumph while the established top guns are left to crunch their juicy offensive stats at home.

 "I think 10 points could win the game," Ravens defensive end Michael McCrary said. "Both teams are very similar with great defences on both sides.

 "It looks like it's going to be a ball-control game."

 That got you excited? Try this.

 "I like boring," Giants defensive end Michael Strahan said. "When we got boring, we started to win."

 For those who equate good football with unbridled offence, it's not going to be much of a party.

 Starting quarterbacks Trent Dilfer of the Ravens and Kerry Collins of the Giants were underachieving retreads whose careers were resuscitated by their respective new teams.

 Both have been dissed and dismissed by critics in the weeks leading to today as being unworthy potential champions.

 FINE WITH COACHES

 Indeed, for the first time since 1972, the game will not feature at least one quarterback bound for the Pro Bowl.

 But that's fine with Ravens coach Brian Billick, who plucked Dilfer out of Tampa Bay where he had been booed mercilessly by the Bucs faithful. It's also fine with Giants coach Jim Fassel, who gambled on recovering alcoholic Collins.

 "This offence has done what it has needed to win," Billick said. "That sounds awful minimalist in approach, but throughout the year we've done that."

 Still, the Ravens have scored twice as many points as allowed, 333 to an NFL record 165. The five most recent teams to do that have won the Super Bowl.

 Collins will be under equally strict instructions not to make it too easy for the opportunistic Ravens defence, which led the NFL by forcing 49 turnovers.

 "I think if you measure the quarterback by what he has done to help win football games, then I've done pretty well," Collins said. "I don't have any special fears. I know (the Ravens) are going to be tough. I know they are going to come after me, but that's part of the game."

 In stark contrast to the conservative approach on offence, the Ravens and Giants have arrived here by punishing their opponents into submission on defence.

 Neither team allowed a touchdown in their conference championships -- the Giants shutting out the Vikings 41-0 and the Ravens beating the Raiders 16-3. It's the first time the two Bowl combatants have done that since the vaunted Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys met in 1979.

 "The bottom line is all you have to do is score one more point than the opponent," Ravens wide receiver Qadry Ismail said. "If you have a defence like ours and put up 10 points and win, then fine."

 LEWIS THE STAR

 If there is star power in this game, it comes from menacing Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis who was as big a story for his off the field troubles as his defensive MVP season.

 Billick fuelled the frenzy this week by urging the media to lay off Lewis' involvement in a double murder at a post Super Bowl party in Atlanta.

 Lewis, who was cleared of murder accusations but found guilty of obstruction of justice, defiantly refused to talk about the incident. He did however, say plenty, from guaranteeing a win, to shooting for a shutout to saying the Ravens defence is the best the game has seen.

 If nothing else, the game gives us the opportunity to see if Lewis is right. And to see which breaks first -- the Ravens No. 1 rushing defence or the No. 2 Giants.

 And at 6:25 p.m. today, regardless of how the teams got here, the talk becomes cheap.

 "In my opinion, all of that goes out the window once you get hit in the face in the game," Dilfer said. "From that point on, it just becomes football."