What's That Feeling?

Truth is, the game never should have come down to that throw. Like the Giants contest at frigid Lambeau Field two years prior, Brett Favre should not have been the game-breaker in the NFC Championship. Opportunities fell in both the Vikings’ and Packers’ laps the nights of their respective championship contents, but neither team could capitalize. Both times, Favre put the final nail in the coffin and felt the sting of defeat.

The worst part of it all? The Vikings were the better team Sunday night. Had it not been for even one of their 3 fumbles, the Vikings would have dominated the Saints, who didn’t seem to realize they were playing for a trip to the Super Bowl. For that matter, neither did the Vikings, who literally gave the championship away. All week, I braced myself for defeat, knowing how explosive the Saints’ offense and how vulnerable our secondary was. Like many fellow Vikes fans, however, I expected a win. That’s what I was thinking; what I felt was an entirely different story.

All day leading up to the game, I had the eerie feeling that the game was already lost. Like there is no sense in playing, history's already written. I told myself it was the magnitude of the game. All my purple friends were confident; why wasn’t I?

Then the game started. Wow, pound that ball in on the first drive to go up 7-0. Confidence builds. Looking back, the way the first half ended was like an omen – the Saints were handing the Vikes the game, but inexperience . . . jitters . . . something caused them to lose focus (and the ball) all night. But they were still in it.

Fast forward to 2:37 left in the game. The Vikings have the ball in the perfect scenario. This is it – beat up all day, Favre and Co. could put the game away on one last, glorious drive to Miami. I’m confident now, after seeing the Vikes fight and claw to stay in the game. This is their time. No, I wouldn’t let myself think it, but I could feel it. The dream was real.

Then it happened.

No, not the pick . . . not yet. It was back – that feeling. As the Vikes lined up after the 2 minute break, my excitement vanished and I was left with an odd, anticlimactic, emptiness. As if I already knew, a foreshadowing of sorts.

The rest is history. Several questionable calls and one weighty questionable decision later, New Orleans was ecstatic and the Vikings were done. Overtime was merely a delay of the inevitable, a prolonging of the misery. Such a perfect, promising season had come to a heart-pounding climax and quickly screeched to a bitter, gut-wrenching, inexplicable end. That feeling of mine? I’m sad to say there was something to it. It could have been the ghosts of Lambeau, making sure Favre's career ended the way it was supposed to in 2007. Or it could have been the result of Minnesota just never putting the game away - a game they should have won by the third quarter.

Some say the journey is the reward. Many expected – and all of us in the purple and gold nation hoped – it would end in Miami. Nevertheless, the 2009 season was quite the ride. The memories should not be tarnished by the way the season ended . . . although we’ll all inevitably wonder “What if?”