Four Key Plays That Changed The Outcome Of Super Bowl Odds

The Green Bay Packers were favored by just three points on the Super Bowl odds but they were never really in a position that they weren’t covering. Here are four keep plays as to why they won:

Super Bowl Odds Factor No. 1: Nick Collins’ Pick-Six

There are certain kinds of plays that cast a longer and larger shadow over a championship football game than others. A pick-six is certainly one such play. Nick Collins didn’t just give Green Bay a 14-0 lead over Pittsburgh with his first-quarter interception return for a touchdown. Collins gave the Packers momentum and an ever-increasing belief that they could win against a team that had won two of the previous five Super Bowls while registering a 6-1 mark in seven prior Super Bowl appearances. If Collins’ teammates, Charles Woodson and Sam Shields, had not gotten injured, it would have been hard to see how Pittsburgh could have made a comeback. At any rate, Collins powerfully propelled the Packers forward on a day when they needed to start strong a lot more than the experienced Steelers did. Pittsburgh knew it could come back against Green Bay, but the Packers didn’t expect to be able to come back from a big deficit against the Steelers’ powerful ground game. When Collins made his move, Green Bay ensured that Pittsburg would have to play catch-up throughout Sunday’s contest.

Super Bowl Odds Factor No. 2: Rashard Mendenhall’s Fumble

Pittsburgh had trimmed a 21-3 deficit to 21-17. The Steelers shut down the Packers in the third quarter, barely allowing any yards at all to the same Green Bay offense that began to flourish in the second quarter. Pittsburgh’s offensive front was beginning to lean on Green Bay’s defensive line with success. The Steelers were inside the Green Bay 35 with a full head of steam. The AFC champions were poised to take the lead and finish off the greatest comeback in Super Bowl history.

And then it all unraveled.

Pittsburgh running back Rashard Mendenhall, who was generally very impressive in this contest, made his only mistake of the night, but it was a costly one. The Illinois product put the ball on the turf at Cowboys Stadium, and the Packers recovered. Pittsburgh never came as close to taking the lead as it did on that fateful possession early in the fourth quarter. This was, simply, the play of the game.

Super Bowl Odds Factor No. 3: Rodgers To Nelson On 3rd and 10

While Mendenhall’s fumble was the night’s most important play, a very close second was the dart Aaron Rodgers threw to receiver Jordy Nelson on a 3rd-and-10 snap for Green Bay near the Pittsburgh 40 early in the fourth quarter. On the previous play, Nelson dropped an easy first-down-gaining pass on a crossing route, injecting fresh waves of anxiety into the veins of the Packer coaching staff, not to mention Green Bay’s fans. Everyone in the ballpark wondered if Nelson was ever going to be able to bounce back from his crippling mistake.

The wait wasn’t very long.

On the very next snap, Nelson once again got free in the same area of the field on a crossing route. He had the same open pastures that emerged on the previous play. This time, though, he held onto Aaron Rodgers’ pass and took the ball to the Pittsburgh 2, setting up the touchdown that gave Green Bay its decisive score of Super Bowl XLV. By wiping out a big mistake with an even bigger catch, Jordy Nelson redeemed himself by the time the evening was over.

Super Bowl Odds Factor No. 4: Pittsburgh’s Personal Foul

This wasn’t a backbreaker, but it didn’t exactly help Pittsburgh’s cause. On the final kickoff of the game, following Green Bay’s field goal with 2:07 left, the Steelers – trailing by six points – needed good field position. The kickoff took eight seconds, running the clock to the 1:59 mark and the two-minute warning, thereby robbing Pittsburgh of an extra play. (Had the kickoff return ended at, let’s say, the 2:02 mark, the Steelers would have gotten another snap.) However, something much worse happened to the AFC champions on the play. A dead-ball personal foul penalty, a clear two-handed shove well after the whistle, created a half-the-distance-to-the-goal mark-off of 13 yards. Pittsburgh, in need of a touchdown and nothing else, started at its own 13-yard line. The Steelers’ odds of winning were reduced at that point, and Green Bay’s defense promptly snuffed out Ben Roethlisberger’s last-ditch drive.