Here's an intersting bit of historical perspective: This marks the 12th time that two teams that met during the regular season eventually squared off in the Super Bowl. Of the previous 11 cases, 4 times the regular season meeting was decided by 8 pts or more, and in each case the winner also won the Super Bowl, usually in a blowout. In the 7 cases where the regular season game was decided by 7 pts or less, the losing team came back to win the Super Bowl 6 out of 7 times (including NE's first SB upset of the mighty Rams).