For Who Dat fans the 2009 NFC Championship game between the New Orleans Saints and Minnesota Vikings was the biggest game to date in their life times.
For the first time in their 44-year existence the Saints were playing in the NFC Championship game for a chance to move on to the Super Bowl. For the Vikings though, post season was a little more familiar. They had made the playoffs 5 of the previous 10 seasons and this was their second trip to the conference title game in that period. A win here and they would advance to the 5th Super Bowl in Vikings franchise history.
Of course the Saints did win. Moving on to upset the Colts in Super Bowl LIV to finally bring a championship to the City of New Orleans. Looking back that game was, to me , probably the most intense, hard fought victories in New Orleans Saints history. The Vikings scored on their opening drive with an Adrian Peterson 19-yard run. The Saints answered with a classic Pierre Thomas screen pass from Drew Brees that went 38 yards down the right sideline to tie the game. Each team went back and forth. The 1st-half ended with the score tied at 14, the 2nd-half ended with a 28-28 tie. And as every Saint fans knows it was the 40-yard Garrett Hartley field goal in overtime that sent New Orleans to the Super Bowl.
Above we see the Saints defense swarming around Adrian Peterson as he has just been brought down by linebacker Jonathan Vilma. Other Saints defenders pictured are Roman Harper (#41), Scott Shanle (#58), Scott Fujita (#55), Anthony Hargrove (#69) and Vilma (#51). And while the Vikings actually recovered the the ball this play they fumbled the ball a total of 6 times losing it 3. All in all they turned it over 5 times to the Saints defense.