Super Bowl XLV ready to rumble

Greenbay Packers, Pittsburg Steelers to clash in the biggest football game of the year

by KATIE SWANN student writer

It’s bowl time, and everyone is taking sides. The championship games are over and the contestants have been named: the Pittsburgh Steelers for the AFC and the Green Bay Packers for the NFC. Now one question remains: Who will be named the No. 1 team of the season?

President Barack Obama weighed in on the matter shortly before the NFC championship game between the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers. He said of his hometown team, “If the Bears win, I’m going, no doubt.”

Surely the morale and location of the Bears vs. Packers championship game in Chicago would raise their beloved Bears to victory.

However, the Packers’ ability to deliver pass after pass kept them a touchdown ahead to the very end.

Following the Green Bay victory, Packers’ corner Charles Woodson said of the president’s statement, “The president don’t want to come watch us at the Super Bowl — guess what? We’re going to see him.” Woodson was referencing the Super Bowl champion trip to the White House. Perhaps he spoke too soon. Green Bay must face a wall of steel, before they can book the plane to Washington.

Both teams have had quite a remarkable season; the Packers seeded sixth in the playoffs, hit their stride and rode it to the top while the Steelers have shown a consistently solid game and skill level that has boosted them to No. 1 in the AFC. Both the Packers and the Steelers have shown an exceptional defensive game and have nearly unstoppable quarterbacks, but critics are giving Green Bay the edge. Why?

“America wants Green Bay to win the Super Bowl,” said bleacherreport.com correspondent Joey Hnath. “The Steelers will be hard pressed to slow down the momentum Green Bay has gained during their playoff run.”

Hnath is referring to the Packers’ ability to seemingly take on any challenge despite a rough start to the season, a maneuver that they have managed time and again all the way to the championship. Not to mention, the Packers have not tasted the Super Bowl in 12 years and haven’t won since ’97. They want it and they’re going for the win.

In contrast, the Steelers have a legacy to maintain. The team has lost only one of the seven Bowls they’ve attended, two of which Big Ben Roethlisberger has led them through as quarterback.

Third time’s the charm, right?

On top of everything, this win would make the Steelers the first team in NFL history to have won seven Super Bowls. This is an opportunity the franchise can’t afford to lose. Statistics favor the team as well, displaying them as first in the league in points per game, yards per play, rushing yards per game, yards per rush, yards per pass attempt, sacks and so on; whereas Green Bay ranked well below Pittsburgh in several of these areas.

“America got the Super Bowl matchup it wanted,” Hnath said.

As sports columnist John Romano of the St. Petersburg Times said in his column on Sunday, Jan. 25,“This one is for the romantics. If you consider scabs, contusions and trauma to be romantic. And this one is for the purists. This is the Super Bowl the NFL finally deserves. It’s got tradition.”

It is a game that’s sure to “pack” the stadium, but who will come out a champion?

Be sure to find out on FOX Feb. 6 at 6:30 p.m. for Super Bowl XLV.