Glendale, AZ--

After watching the confetti drop on the New York Giants tonight in Glendale, I too said to myself that perfection is not skin deep and anyone can scrape it right off the surface in just 60 minutes..

Tonight the New England Patriots know exactly what that is all about after seeing their dream come to 17-14 end tonight at the hands of the G Men.

"Any time you have a team that's 18-0, stop and think about that, in this league," said Giants head coach Tom Coughlin. "That's just an incredible accomplishment for them.

"But our team, we've been building momentum and building momentum. If you're going to have a chance to win, you're going to have to play great defense, and we certainly did, really, throughout the entire playoffs, and certainly tonight was a great example of it.

"It was a tremendous team effort all the way around, and just a wonderful way to end this thing."

Eli Manning who has done nothing but show how he has come into his own throughout the season made one of the best drives in NFL history in the fourth quarter which included a 13-yard pass to Plaxico Burress in the corner of the end zone -- over Patriots cornerback Ellis Hobbs -- to put the Giants over the top with 35 seconds left. It was the culmination of the kind of last-minute, game-winning, 12-play, 83-yard drive.

"It feels great," Eli Manning said, speaking so uncharacteristically fast it was almost hard to follow him. "It's unbelievable. It's the fight on this team. We find a way to win."

On the other side of the ball, Patriots quarterback Tom Brady was in shock when asked about the outcome of tonight's game.

"We just can't believe what happened tonight, we are all looking for ways to figure out what happened tonight," said Brady. "We just have to regroup and come back next year.

With the victory tonight by the Giants, it makes them the fifth team to win the Super Bowl as a Wild Card.

The 1972 Dolphins, who were 17-0, remain the only team to finish a season perfect. The Patriots finish 18-1 after a 16-0 regular season. The Giants, 12-point underdogs Sunday, finished 10-6, 4-0, becoming the first NFC wild card team to win a Super Bowl.

For Patriots fans tonight is a huge letdown. To go undefeated during the preseason, regular season and playoffs and then to lose to the Giants in the Super Bowl is worthless to many fans. Some were saying that they would have seen a couple of losses during the season and the trophy tonight.