The Match-Up We've All Been Waiting For

This is one of those rare seasons in which things played out according to design. While recent Super Bowls have featured an upstart or two -- some wild card team that got hot at the right time and plowed through three road victories to get to the Big Game -- this year's match-up is just what it was supposed to be.

The NFC's #1 seed faces the AFC's #1 seed. The two teams that were flirting with perfect seasons all the way into December are the two teams still standing at the end of January.

And so Super Bowl XLIV is exactly what we've all been waiting for, right? It's just what we expected. It was in the stars.

Except for this... Whatever happened to "defense wins championships"?

That truism has been NFL orthodoxy for years, and most years it is an arguable position. But this year, the Jets, Ravens, Cowboys, Vikings, Chargers, and Packers are all sitting at home on Super Bowl Sunday.

When you think of the Jets, you think of Ryan's amazing defensive schemes. When you think of the Ravens, you think of Ray Lewis. The Vikings had Jared Allen and the Williams boys. The Packers had the Defensive Player of the Year, Dom Capers, and one of the top-ranked defenses in the league.

But it's the Colts and Saints meeting in Miami this Sunday. And when you think of the Colts and the Saints, what do you think of? Offense! High-scoring, explosive offenses led by two of the game's most prolific passers. No one is debating which defense will be able to shut down the other team. All the speculation is about which offense will be able to outscore the other. Indeed, the only attention being paid to the defensive side of the ball at all in the week leading up to the Super Bowl is the interest in Dwight Freeney's ankle.

So it's the match-up we've been waiting for -- the top two seeds, the two best teams -- except that, no matter which team wins, it seems that offense wins championships this year.