Super Bowl Monday_ From the Persian Gulf to the Shores of West Florida - Adam Lazarus [46]
The Giants drew Chicago in the second round of the postseason. Similar to their opponent, the Bears had fallen fast and hard after a fantastic start to the 1990 season. Mike Ditka’s team began 9-1, only to lose four of their remaining six games. And despite their 16-6 wild-card triumph over New Orleans in the next round of the playoffs, they were no match for the Giants.
Bill Parcells and offensive coordinator Ron Erhardt showed faith in Hostetler from the very beginning. New York’s opening possession came with the Giants pinned deep inside their own territory. Rather than play it safe and run the ball on first down, the Giants threw.
“That was a real confidence booster,” Hostetler said. “That’s not the easiest place to throw from.”
Hostetler passed on first down six times in the first quarter alone, a whopping number for the run-dedicated head coach. Ahead 3-0, Parcells even shunned a forty-three-yard field goal attempt to throw on fourth down and inches to go: Hostetler rolled right and completed a six-yard pass to tight end Bob Mrosko. On the next play, Stephen Baker hauled in a perfectly placed, over-the-shoulder pass at the back-left corner of the end zone to give the Giants a 10-0 lead.
“All day, the play-calling, I felt, showed confidence in me,” Hostetler said.
Confidence in the defense also soared after a critical fourth down and short early in the second quarter.
The Bears finished the 1990 season averaging 152 rushing yards per game, second in the NFL. Neal Anderson—the heir-apparent to Walter Payton—spearheaded the attack, posting his third consecutive 1,000-yard season. To defend Chicago, assistant coach Bill Belichick made the bold switch from their standard 3-4 defense to a 4-3 approach.
“Hopefully, it would give the Bears the most trouble,” said the team’s thirty-year-old defensive coordinator. “It wasn’t that big an adjustment for our guys. Nobody played a position they hadn’t been at sometime during the year. But the combination was a different look for the offense with Lawrence Taylor and Carl Banks as true outside linebackers.”
The change was brilliant. Spurred on by a momentous fourth-down goal-line stand at the one-yard line, the Giants suffocated Chicago’s offense.
“They forced us to a passing game,” Ditka lamented. “And I don’t like to play that kind of game.”
Ill-equipped to be one-dimensional, Chicago’s offense attempted thirty-six passes, gaining just 205 yards. The new-look Giants defense forced three turnovers, did not allow a single rushing first down, and kept the Bears out of the end zone the entire afternoon.
Meanwhile, New York’s offense was efficient, if not spectacular, against the aging Bears. With under a minute remaining in the second quarter, Hostetler sprinted out of the pocket and flicked a five-yard touchdown pass to tight end Howard Cross, extending the lead to 17-3. In the second half, touchdown runs by Hostetler and Maurice Carthon built an insurmountable 31-3 advantage.
New York rushed for 194 yards, controlled the ball for thirty-eight minutes and converted all four of their fourth-down attempts, all the while gradually restoring faith to the quarterback position.
“We’re very predictable around here,” Parcells facetiously remarked in the locker room. “Today, I think you would have to say we were a little less predictable. We were still very predictable but we were a little less predictable today.”
The lone objective that the Giants did not achieve against Chicago was to stay healthy.
In the second quarter, New York ran another surprising first-down pass play. Defensive tackle Steve McMichael sacked Hostetler, who fumbled. Rodney Hampton recovered the ball and picked up three yards before