Eavesdropping on the Super Bowl Sidelines

Eavesdropping on the Super Bowl Sidelines “Make them go to Manningham” — five words that will haunt Patriots fans and delight Giants fans for years to come.

The sideline instruction to his defense, which turned painfully prophetic, was captured by an NFL Network show that wired several players, coaches and officials in Sunday’s game.

Crouched on the sideline in front of the players, Belichick emphasized that they had to focus on Giants receivers Hakeem Nicks and Victor Cruz.

“This is still a Cruz and Nicks game,” he said. “I mean I know we’re right on them, it’s tight. But those are still the guys. Make them go to Manningham, make them go to Pascoe, all right. But let’s make sure we get Cruz and Nicks.”

As if on cue, Eli Manning went to Mario Manningham, whose dazzling 38-yard reception along the sideline, as he barely kept his feet inbounds, sparked the winning drive. The catch occurred right in front of Belichick, who challenged the play. It was not reversed.

There was no doubt in Tom Brady’s mind about whether the play would be reversed. Looking dejected on the sideline after watching the replay, he said simply, “He caught it.”

The Super Bowl edition of “Sound FX” was televised Wednesday and will be replayed Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern.

When Patriots receiver Wes Welker failed to hang on to a pass from Brady on second-and-11 from the Giants’ 44 with about four minutes remaining, at least one of the game officials appreciated the significance. The ball fell from Welker’s hands at the Giants’ 20, with the Patriots leading, 17-15.

After the drop, the referee John Parry turned to a fellow official and said, “Whoa, that was the game.” And it was, as the Patriots soon punted and Manning completed the comeback for a 21-17 Giants victory.

It was the most pivotal play of the game in a measurement of Win Probability, according to Brian Burke of Advanced NFL Stats. A catch by Welker would have given the Patriots a 95 percent chance to win. Welker’s drop lowered the percentage to 65.

Other highlights:

¶ Before Ahmad Bradshaw’s should-I-score-or-not touchdown, Patriots linebacker Jerod Mayo said in the huddle, “We’ve got to let them score.” Wilfork agreed, saying, “Let them score.”

Brady, again gloomily, figured the Giants wouldn’t take the bait, saying, “They’re not going to score.”

¶ The Giants were fortunate to recover their two fumbles. (Another fumble was wiped out on a Patriots penalty.) Giants guard Chris Snee recovered one, but Wilfork jumped into the fray and grabbed the ball after the whistle. An official told Wilfork: “Nice try, Vince. He got it.”

In another instance, Wilfork admitted to an official that a holding penalty on the Giants’ Kevin Boothe was a bad call: “As much as you guys miss, I deserve one.”

¶ Giants linebacker Michael Boley said to his teammates that Rob Gronkowski “was a decoy,” meaning that he wouldn’t be near his best because of his injured left ankle. “He’s about to be out of here,” Boley said.

Gronkowski, who set an N.F.L. record for tight ends with 17 touchdown receptions, was limited to two catches for 26 yards.

¶ Before the game, Welker told Brady, “I’m open on every play.” Brady said, “I know you are.”

But after two of his passes were batted down, Brady said, “It’s like throwing in a forest.”

¶ Before Brady’s final heave to the end zone, he told Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez, “Run to the goal post and catch it.” Gronkowski almost did.

Super Bowl — Giants Take Victory Lap in Lower Manhattan

Super Bowl — Giants Take Victory Lap in Lower Manhattan The celebration kicked off with a parade that wound north up Broadway’s Canyon of Heroes, amid a sea of confetti, horns and fans in blue jerseys, and ended with a ceremony at City Hall Plaza, where Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg presented the players with keys to the city.

“Today, I am declaring the Big Apple the Big Blue Apple, and if you got a problem with that, you can talk to this guy,” Bloomberg said, gesturing to the former Giants defensive end Michael Strahan. Bloomberg added, “We are here today because this team of Giants believed in each other and because you believed in them.”

For the throngs of fans who showed up, the day started early. Bleary-eyed police officers who had been in position since before sunrise wielded cups of coffee. Stacks of Giants-centric newspapers were for sale, as were red, white and blue balloon hats and miniature American flags. Occasionally, mini footballs and rolls of toilet paper soared across the street, drawing chants and screams from the crowd. Backpacks stashed with bottled water, potato chips and cookies — perhaps left over from Super Bowl parties on Sunday — fueled the fans, who used everything from sick days to camera phones to face paint to show their devotion.

“The Giants are our life,” Ross Turrini, who took his son and daughter, Nick and Emily, ages 11 and 14, to the city Monday night from Merrick, N.Y., to stake out a good spot. By 7:30 Tuesday morning, they had found prime viewing territory on the corner of Broadway and Cedar Street. Turrini said that when he heads to Boston this week on business, “I’m wearing my Giants jersey.”

Attendance at New York City schools was 89.4 percent Tuesday, according to the City’s Department of Education. The average attendance for Tuesdays is 91 percent. In a school system of about 1.1 million, that two-percent difference represented about 20,000 students.

 The Giants’ welcome did draw criticism, as some have argued that returning Iraq war veterans deserve one of their own. Tuesday’s parade was the fourth in the city since 2000 to honor the Giants or the Yankees.

Richard Sedotto stood on top of an orange, five-gallon bucket, surveying the growing crowd. To his left, he had more buckets stacked up, on sale for $10 each. “They’re great for kids or short people who can’t see the parade,” he said. By 8:30, Sedotto, a contractor from West Babylon, N.Y., said he had sold 200.

“The price will go up as the day goes on,” he said. “Hey, you can put beer in it, too! I don’t care what you do with it!”

By the time the parade began at Battery Place shortly after 11 a.m., Emily Vail and her mother, Bobby, from Montclair, N.J., had been by Bowling Green for almost six hours, waiting for a chance to glimpse Eli Manning, Tom Coughlin, Justin Tuck and others.

Emily Vail, 31, works as a pastry chef and said she left for the city right after her 9 p.m.-to-4:30 a.m. shift ended. As for her mother, recently retired from her job as a school nurse, “I have time for crazy things like this now,” she said. High above them, office workers in the surrounding buildings threw shredded paper out of their windows.

The parade lasted about an hour. The Giants players rode on floats, and 14 red and blue double-decker buses carried team personnel and their family members and friends.

Patrick Flynn, the bandleader for the New York City Sanitation Department’s Emerald Society Pipes and Drums, said his group was thrilled to be playing their bagpipes in the parade. “We do it all,” he said. “Now, we got to look forward to playing for the Yankees’ championship.”

Many fans said they were still reeling from Sunday night’s game, a 21-17 Giants win that was in doubt until the final second.

“Does it look like I have nails?” Michael Hagelin of the Bronx said, holding out his gnawed fingertips. “The last two weeks have been crazy.”

Adding to Hagelin’s tension was the tattoo he got on his right forearm — “Giants” in letters about seven inches wide and two inches high — two weeks before the Super Bowl victory.

“I just knew they were going to win,” said Hagelin, an emergency medical technician who said he requested the time off for the parade weeks ago. “I’ve seen them at their best and I’ve seen them when they were no good. It feels good to be a New Yorker.”

Joseph Fabrizio, 22, shaved the Giants’ logo into his head Monday. It took him two hours, he said, and involved multiple razors and mirrors.

He took the train in from Long Island at 4:30 a.m., calling in sick to his job as a heating and air systems installer.

“It’s the Giants’ victory,” he said. “We got to celebrate.”

At City Hall, the Giants crossed the stage one by one to receive their keys to the city from Bloomberg.

Seating for the event was limited to the news media, city officials, friends and family of the players and team officials, but some 500 fans also secured tickets through a public giveaway Monday. Others watched on large monitors set up on the surrounding streets. By 2 p.m., street cleaners were working their way up and down Broadway and leaf blowers were moving the confetti and crushed soda cans away. The Giants made their way to New Jersey, where about 40,000 fans waited for a second celebration at MetLife Stadium, and the fans headed for the subways, back to work or into local bars.

Tricia Nasta, 29, and her boyfriend, Jose Moreno, 32, had red, white and blue Giants logos that sparkled on their faces. They arrived from Ronkonkoma, N.Y., at about 5 a.m. for the celebration and were among the handful of fans able to make it into the ceremony.

“It was so great to see Eli,” Nasta said. “We’re just so glad they won.”

Super Bowl — Lesser-Known Giants Have Their Moment, Too

Super Bowl — Lesser-Known Giants Have Their Moment, Too  People in Justin Tuck jerseys lined the Canyon of Heroes. The crowd showered Eli Manning with chants of “M.V.P.!” On a stage at City Hall, Victor Cruz performed his trademark salsa dance for onlookers, some of whom mimicked his hip-swaying moves.

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All of this was to be expected at Tuesday’s ticker-tape parade in honor of the Giants’ Super Bowl XLVI victory over the New England Patriots. But the raucous celebration was also an opportunity for some of the team’s less-heralded players to soak in New York City’s adulation.

Fans shouted for receiver Ramses Barden, who did not play in the postseason. Just like the rest of his teammates, Adrian Tracy, a linebacker on the practice squad, received a key to the city from Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. The backup quarterback David Carr appeared to record the proceedings from his cellphone as his float rolled beneath fluttering scraps of paper.

The glorious ride up Broadway might have been the most surreal for tight end Bear Pascoe, who grew up in California on a cattle ranch where acres stretched as far as the eye could see.

“That was like nothing else I’ve ever experienced,” Pascoe said after the parade. “That was really cool, really cool. To see the city turn out like that, and stuff coming down from the windows.”

Wearing a camouflage cap and a Giants sweatshirt, Pascoe was joined on the float by, among others, the injured tight ends Jake Ballard and Travis Beckum, who both walked with crutches because of the knee injuries they sustained during the Super Bowl.

Before the tight ends’ float turned left onto Broadway and moved past the “Charging Bull,” the well-known Wall Street statue in Lower Manhattan, the tight ends coach Mike Pope turned to Pascoe and told him to soak it all in, to enjoy the moment.

A few in the crowd even recognized Pascoe and yelled out his name. (The fans were less familiar with the members of the news media standing on a flatbed truck in front of Pascoe’s float, chanting “Who are you?” as the vehicle shuttled past.)

Pascoe waved to the crowd, which did not greet his float with as loud a roar as it did Manning’s. But while his contingent moved past the Trinity Church on Wall Street, a man in the crowd threw Pascoe a football. Pascoe caught it, autographed it and threw it back. Earlier, Pascoe caught a roll of toilet paper and threw it back into the crowd.

While spectators wearing throwback Lawrence Taylor and Rodney Hampton jerseys outnumbered those in Pascoe jerseys — if there actually were any — Pascoe noticed a woman holding a sign for him. Its flirtatious message was, “I Like Bear Pascoe’s Tight End.”

“I got a girlfriend, ladies,” Pascoe said afterward.

His girlfriend, Katie, was there Tuesday, riding in a separate bus. She did not see the sign from Pascoe’s admirer, but said of its message: “No way! Oh, I think that’s going to catch on.”

Among the other players to receive some of the limelight were the injured starters Jonathan Goff and Terrell Thomas, both of whom missed the season because of knee injuries. Also joining the Giants on stage at City Hall was the rookie defensive tackle Marvin Austin, who missed the season with a torn pectoral muscle.

Perhaps the most amusing instance of newfound fame among lesser-known players was shown on the Twitter feed of the reserve defensive end Justin Trattou.

From a reception after the parade, Trattou sent a photograph of him with the clock-wearing rapper Flavor Flav.