In Championship Week’s Eastern Championship game Sunday, a blowout of major proportions saw the team that relied on Tony Romo and the Seahawks defense hit a dry hole.  P-WOP! was the sound of the Green and Black getting slammed to the floor of the Vortex, as Pirkle’s Wicked Oil Profiteer$ saw their five game winning streak and Super Bowl dreams dashed, courtesy of a 52 – 2 shellacking at the hands of the Colossal Waste of Time.  Led by running back Steven Jackson’s 11 points, the C.W.O.T. got 28 points from its backfield, as QB Carson Palmer had a productive 8 points, and #2 RB Earnest Graham added another 9.  The ground attack, which produced 222 yards and 2 touchdowns, didn’t leave much for the C.W.O.T. receivers, who combined for just 6 points, but defense and special teams more than picked up the slack.  Kicker Steven Gostkowski airmailed his usual 8 points, and then Jody turned it over to his Tampa Bay defense.  The Buccaneers responded with their best performance of the season – two DTDs to go with 21 takeaway points, for 27 total.  They smothered the P.W.O.P. offense, giving up only 133 yards and harassing Romo into a -1 total which was, by far, his worst performance of the season.  Romo threw three interceptions, two of which the Bucs D returned for touchdowns.  The combined P.W.O.P. backfield score was an abysmal 1 point, with running backs Rudi Johnson and Kevin Jones running for just 16 yards each and posting identical single digit scores.  Tight end Tony Gonzalez rounded out the binary scoring with his ace.  Paul and the Profiteer$ fans no doubt posted some “single digits” themselves as they watched their beloved P.W.O.P. tally its lowest total score of the season at the worst possible time.  Small matter that Marques Colston played one of his best games of the season and led the oilmen with 9 points.  Forced to spend most of the game on the field by the ineptitude of the P.W.O.P. offense, Paul’s Seahawks D laid a zero turnover, zero sack, zero total in finishing off a total team meltdown.

The C.W.O.T., winners of the Eastern Division but only 1-4 during the regular season against Western Division foes, redeemed itself and the junior division with its blowout win over the Profiteer$, a win which puts Jody in the Super Bowl for a record fifth time.  Maybe fifth time is a charm here, and the Jodys can finally add a Super Bowl Trophy to go with all those Eastern Division titles.

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Championship Week ‘07 concluded Sunday night with the league’s regular season champion – the Thomas Bock Boys – falling victim to the league’s highest scoring team in the battle of the league’s best offenses.  The Anderson Brewmeisters, the inconsistent sixth playoff seed that led the league in average score but finished the regular season only 7-6, dug out of another first-quarter hole to emerge on top of a 27 – 21, hard-fought contest with the Thomas Bock Boys.  In winning the Western Division Championship, the Brewmeisters punched their tickets to Glendale, while the Bock Boys punched out – their turnaround season cut short a game early. 

The game was rich in action as well as drama.  After filling in admirably for the injured Jeff Garcia, Bock Boys play caller David Garrard was a surprise late scratch, as Garcia unexpectedly took the field.  Having built their game plan around Garrard, the Brewmeisters were slow to adjust, and the Bock Boys took an early lead when Garcia hit wide receiver Greg Jennings on a 44 yard scoring strike.  (Jennings 6 points to lead all receivers would later become a telling statistic.)  The lead grew for the home team when the Patriots defense took a Peyton Manning interception to the house.  The Pats would go on to play one of their best defensive games of the season, sacking Manning 5 times en route to posting 19 takeaway points to go with their DTD. 

By the second quarter, however, the Brewskies were showing signs of life, as the league’s best rushing attack began to find a rhythm.  Alternating carries with stablemate Brian Westbrook, LaDanian Tomlinson scored the first of his two rushing touchdowns.  Tomlinson would go on to total 116 yards rushing and lead all players with 12 points.  Westbrook added 7 points on 81 rushing and 63 receiving yards.  When the Pats D stacked the line to stop the run, Manning found the endzone with a four yard toss to wide receiver Tory Holt (4 points).  Manning, who tallied a workmanlike 7 points, would go on to pass for 276 yards, including 72 to wideout Steve Smith, who also finished with 4 points, and 40 to Kevin Curtis (2 points).  Kicker Phil Dawson added another 7 on two field goals, one of which was a 49-yarder.

The Boys tried to regain their early momentum, and pushed the Brewskies’ Chargers down the field, with Jamal Lewis gaining 163 yards and leading his team with 9 points. But the Brewskies’ bend-don’t-break Chargers D kept Lewis out of the endzone, and bottled up Marion Barber completely, the Boys’ #2 running back gaining only 32 yards in a 2-point performance.  The Boys tried to pass, but the defense shut that down, too.  Garcia could manage only 109 yards in the air, and league-leading receiver Randy Moss was held out of the endzone for the second straight week, finishing with only 4 points.  As the drives stalled, the Boys were forced to settle for Nick Folk field goals.

In the fourth quarter, the Chargers got in front of a Garcia pass intended for Plax Burress (2 points on 35 receiving yards), returning it 18 yards for a DTD which gave the Brewmeisters a nine point lead.  After Folk (6 points) kicked the second of his two field goals, the Brewmeisters’ Brian Westbrook made what was easily the most controversial play of the weekend.  With his team up by six late, Westbrook broke loose for what appeared to be a sure Brewskie touchdown.  Rather than go in for the score, however, Westbrook paid the Bock Boys the ultimate compliment, as he stopped and took a knee on the one yard line, enabling the Brewmeisters to run out the clock rather than risk another miraculous last second Bock Boys comeback (a la week 12 against the Raze).  With no timeouts left for Thomas, Manning was able to take a knee three straight times, ending both the game and the Bock Boys’ outstanding season.  In making a 7-victory turnaround from worst to first this year, the Old Coach got lucky with the Randy Moss trade, but otherwise did an outstanding coaching job in cobbling together a team that finished second in the league in overall scoring.

The victory by the Brewmeisters enables theme to join divisional rivals the Colossal Waste of Time in Super Bowl XI, as the only two teams from the Eastern Division to make the playoffs vie for league supremacy.  No matter how this Super Bowl turns out, an Eastern Division team will emerge on TOP – quite an accomplishment for the division that had sand kicked in its face all season, eh?

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