• The team closed its season with a bizarre-ending win over a pretty good team which still had a chance at the playoffs. Fred Taylor rushed for 194 yards and quarterback Byron Leftwich came back from two first-half interceptions to play a smart second half. The big winners: the defense, which allowed a touchdown (other than the wild last play) only after a Leftwich interception gave New Orleans only nine yards to go.
• Easy prediction: the final three-lateral TD play by New Orleans will be replayed continually over the next week and you’ll argue that the first lateral was forward, which would have negated the play. “I couldn’t tell during the play, but the replay looked pretty obvious that it was a forward lateral,” said Jag Coach Jack Del Rio.
• Also to be replayed: John Carney’s missed extra point to end the game. Del Rio said he was preparing for overtime but wasn’t surprised that he missed. “He had been kicking low all day,” said the coach. “If he had kicked it straight, we would have blocked it.”
• The buildup for Mark Brunell’s final home game was big but the actual go-away wasn’t much. The fans gave him a two-minute standing ovation when he was introduced and he was named a game captain, but that was it and he spent the rest of the day in the bench area, wearing a baseball cap. His non-playing status was cemented when the team activated taxi squad quarterback Quinton Gray before the game.
• And if it seemed liked the sidelines were a little more crowded than usual, they were. There were extra camera crews and photographers covering Brunell’s farewell.
• Brunell’s final salute to the Alltel crowd: a visit to fans in the North end zone.
• Jag kicker Seth Marler’s good start, with two long field goals, was clouded by a blocked FG that would have put the game away. But his good kicks weren’t the day’s most impressive. That would go to Saints quarterback Aaron Brooks after his fourth-quarter pass to tie the game was batted down. The ball was rolling on the turf and he booted it 40 yards, almost into the stands.
• The crowd was better than expected (49,207) on the cold day. One area that didn’t have much action was the practice fields behind the South end zone, where a dozen or so companies have hospitality areas. No word on how many were invited, but not many showed up.
• Fans listening to the game on radio might have wondered who was in the booth with Jags announcer Brian Sexton. It was Jeff Lageman; he just didn’t sound like himself because of a cold.
• Nice touch: Santa hats for the kids in the “Honor Rows” along the top of the North end zone, courtesy of the Jaguars Foundation.
• Missing from the field: the Jags logo at midfield wasn’t adorned with a Santa cap as in previous years. But the Roar were decked out for the holidays in Christmas outfits.
• It was the final home game and the concessionaires made sure there wouldn’t be a big inventory. Several stands ran out of food and beverage and the Club levels were out of some products by halftime.
• Is it serious about ex-Jag Coach Tom Coughlin going to the New York Giants, as we told you last week? Sure is . . . we now find out that he’s so sure that he’ll get a head coaching job — if not with the Giants, then another of the many teams expected to fire their head coach — that he’s been lining up a staff.
• The two major sports talk stations (AM-930 and AM-1460) here have a fierce rivalry and a third is getting stronger. AM-1570 will move to AM-970 on Jan. 5, getting a much broader range for its main personalities, morning talkers Dan Hicken and Jeff Prosser from Ch. 12/25.
• You guessed it; beer sales were way off due to the 50-degree weather. Even the two busloads of party-hearty New Orleans fans, who overnighted at the Omni and reportedly had a great time Friday night at the Landing, didn’t take up the slack.
• The additional seats for the Gator Bowl game are in place. There are 3,300 sitting atop the South end zone party areas but were sealed off to fans Sunday. The area usually has a dozen or so vendors, but the Gator Bowl made up for their loss of business.
• Fred Taylor said that was the wildest finish he’s seen since “USC or whoever it was” ran through the band in a college game. Actually, it was California vs. a John Elway-led Stanford team in the early 1980s.
• A day before the officiating crew for Sunday’s game had to sort out one of the more miraculous plays in NFL history, they visited Wolfson’s Children’s Hospital to meet with children and their families.
• Next week: the season ends in Atlanta for a 1 p.m. game with the Falcons. The game has no meaning to anyone but the two teams as both are way out of the playoffs, but Del Rio said he expects a top effort to get the team moving into the next season with momentum. Football season never ends, though; the Jags then get ready for the free agent signing period and the college draft.
— by Jeff Brooks and Fred Seely