With the Super Bowl just a few days away, it’s fun to reminisce about some of the greatest moments in the game’s history. The Pittsburgh Steelers, who have six Lombardi Trophies in their case, have plenty of moments worth talking about. ESPN’s Andrew Hawkins attempted to rank the greatest catches in Super Bowl history on Get Up this morning and he had Santonio Holmes’ game-winning toe-tapping TD catch at No. 2. How can that be?
The Steelers were down 23-20 to the Arizona Cardinals, and Ben Roethlisberger had just targeted Holmes on the other side of the end zone for a drop. That didn’t stop him from going right back to his top receiver at the time. With 43 seconds remaining, Roethlisberger threw it over three Cardinals defenders into the outstretched arms of Holmes for one of the most thrilling moments in Super Bowl history.
It wasn’t technically a walk-off win, but it was just about as close as you’re going to get in the Super Bowl.
“Everybody remembers this catch in the back of the end zone,” Hawkins said. “On the Hawk meter, this is a 100. [With] 100 chances for Hawk to make this catch, do I do it? Absolutely not. This is an incredible catch, and number two.”
Get Up host Mike Greenberg immediately questioned how that could possibly miss out on the top spot.
Hawkins ended up ranking WR David Tyree’s helmet catch as the No. 1 catch in Super Bowl history. There is no doubt it was a great play, and it led to the New York Giants pulling off the upset against an undefeated New England Patriots team to prevent a perfect season.
Eli Manning somehow escaped what looked like a certain sack and heaved one up to the unheralded Tyree. He high pointed the ball and pinned it to the top of his helmet as he fell to the ground for a 32-yard gain on the crucial third down. The Giants were trailing by four with 1:15 remaining in the game. It led to the win, but it wasn’t technically the game-winning play as they still needed to march about 24 additional yards.
“The greatest catch in Super Bowl history here,” Hawkins said. “This is 105 on the Hawk meter. If you gave me 105 times to catch it, I would drop it 110 times.”
Both plays were crucial to securing a Super Bowl win, and both plays had an extremely high degree of difficulty involved. Do you agree with these rankings?
