Super Bowl Capsules: Faith-ful coach's reward: Super Bowl platform

GRAPEVINE - A few days before playing a group of teenage prison inmates, Faith Christian School coach Kris Hogan sent an e-mail to every parent at his school.

Make a big pregame "spirit line," just like you do for your own kids, he asked. Then, sit behind the visitors' bench and root for the Gainesville State School Tornadoes.

They did. And what Hogan saw in the faces of the Gainesville players was all the satisfaction he needed.

Yet he's gotten so much more - including an invitation to the Super Bowl.

Hogan is headed to Tampa as a guest of USA Football, the national governing body for the sport at youth and amateur levels. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell will honor him at a news conference Friday, and he'll attend the game itself.

"I hate it that this thing that we did is so rare," Hogan said Monday. "Everybody views it as such a big deal. Shouldn't that be the normal m.o., though?"

To Hogan's team, it is. In fact, their treatment of the Gainesville squad was the fourth example this season of the way they blend faith and sportsmanship.

It started in late August, when a rival player died in a car accident a few days after playing Faith. Hogan's players went to the funeral as a group, standing side by side in their red jerseys on a strip of grass outside the chapel.

Soon after, the team from John Curtis Christian School near New Orleans borrowed one of Faith's buses and a practice field while in the area for a Labor Day game at Texas Stadium against national powerhouse Euless Trinity. At the same time, Hurricane Ike was threatening to wipe out everything Curtis had rebuilt since Hurricane Katrina. Although disaster was avoided back home, Curtis' trip was extended several days, pushing hotel and food bills way up. So Hogan organized a dinner and Curtis coaches left with a "love offering," an envelope stuffed with cash and checks from Faith boosters.

In Faith's next game, a rival player went down with a neck injury. As he was being loaded into an ambulance, Faith players went across the field to be with their foes, then all dropped to a knee in prayer. Faith's cheerleaders did the same with their counterparts.

As for the football part of the season, Faith went 9-3, losing in the regional round of the private school playoffs. It was quite an achievement considering this was their first season in the largest classification.

"We've won nine state championships (in all sports) the last four years, so we obviously play to win," Hogan said. "But on the other hand, we believe winning is not what you strive for, it's simply a byproduct of doing things right."

Hogan is the grandson of a preacher and has a grandmother who taught Sunday school for 60 years, but he didn't affirm his own Christian faith until 15 years ago, as a college sophomore. Within weeks, he said, his life began falling into place.

This is his sixth year as athletic director at Faith Christian, a school of 635 students from kindergarten through 12th grade in a residential neighborhood of this Dallas-Fort Worth suburb.

The school was supposed to play this season in a district with schools in Midland and Lubbock, but when gas was $4 per gallon school officials opted to move up to a bigger class, and a grouping with local schools - including the Gainesville facility run by the Texas Youth Commission.

At his first meeting of district ADs, Hogan and Mike Williams of Gainesville hit it off right away, and Hogan began planning for Gainesville's visit.

"I could just feel it in my spirit. ... That is a ministry opportunity we've got to capture," he said.

Gainesville has about 260 boys, incarcerated for various reasons. Football is a privilege given only to juniors and seniors who've excelled in the classroom and obeyed everywhere else - the same requirements that can help speed their release. Williams calls the boys who suit up each week "our role models, the ones we've helped correct."

"Some weeks I might take 25 or 28, sometimes 12 or 13," Williams said. "We went through six quarterbacks this year."

Between adult chaperones, the occasional relative and other supporters, Gainesville gets about 40 fans per game. Teams often greet them with a small banner, sometimes lending the junior varsity cheerleaders.

At Faith, two rows of 100 people lined up for them, stretching about 40 yards. They were connected by a banner roughly 20 feet wide.

"At first, our kids were scared. They were real anxious," Williams said. "I said, 'Burst through the banner and have fun!'"

Hogan saw Gainesville players scanning the stands "just to check the genuineness of what was going on." With Faith players helping Gainesville players up after tackles, they realized the emotions were real; the 5-gallon drums being pounded behind their bench really were thumping for them.

"Their eyes were just screaming gratitude," Hogan said.

Faith won 33-14, ending Gainesville's season at 0-9. You couldn't tell as both teams prayed together afterward, then left with a mixture of smiles and tears.

A story in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram the next day led to a column by ESPN's Rick Reilly. Troy Aikman made sure Goodell read it, leading to the invitation for this weekend. The fallout has helped Gainesville, too, with Williams noticing warmer welcomes at basketball games and more kids wanting to play football.

"Coach Hogan inspired an entire community in an extraordinary way and gave those young men on the Gainesville team a chance to believe in themselves," Goodell said. "It's a powerful message and shows how football can be such a positive force in shaping values and building communities."

Super arrivals: Cardinals and Steelers in Tampa

TAMPA, Fla. - The pilot of their airplane stuck a team flag out the cockpit window as the Arizona Cardinals landed in a place few could have imagined.

Ever.

A team whose fans haven't touched ground since the start of a stunning postseason run in early January, arrived in the Super Bowl city Monday. With many players videotaping the proceedings - the walk across the tarmac, the bus ride to the team hotel, the first onslaught of media - it was clear that just being here meant something to a franchise long considered an NFL doormat.

"It's a great moment," said safety Adrian Wilson, the longest-tenured Cardinal. "To be here, to go through all the teams, to go through all the players, it's big for the whole organization. It's big for the players who are here right now.

"You never know the type of team you have and you never know the circumstances. This team and this group of guys who you have right now, I think we are special."

Not that the Steelers, seeking an unprecedented sixth Super Bowl title, don't have a special feeling about their surroundings. Even though a huge chunk of them have been this route before, the cameras were out, the smiles were wide, and the warm sun was welcoming.

"Are you kidding?" said wide receiver Hines Ward, the MVP of the Steelers' 2006 Super Bowl win over Seattle. "It's very nice to be in Tampa; it was snowing on our way here. They had to defrost the plane there was so much snow on the ground.

"It's the Super Bowl and it's a great event to take part in and, personally, I love the South, everything about being down in the South," said Ward, who grew up in Georgia. "Being in Florida, the weather is something. It definitely beats being back in Pittsburgh."

Ward and his teammates fully expect Tampa to resemble the Steel City by the weekend. No, not weather-wise; if that happens, rest assured the NFL won't be bringing its extravaganza back here. But in color, as in black and gold.

Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger envisions a tsunami of Terrible Towels.

"It's awesome," he said. "Every time we go to an away-city, in a way it feels like a home game because there are so many fans. We expect them to be out there and having fun."

For now, with no practice sessions until Wednesday, the players actually can have some fun, too. Not too much, of course.

Neither coach is about to clamp down on his players this early in the week. They promise to keep things reasonable and as normal as possible, so don't look for any early curfews like the ones Dick Vermeil imposed on his 1980 Eagles. Philly's players got tighter as the week wore on, even as the Oakland Raiders were partying across New Orleans.

By game time, the Eagles could barely breathe, let along play football, and they were routed by the loose Raiders.

"He hasn't put any handcuffs on us," James Harrison, the defensive player of the year, said, referring to coach Mike Tomlin. "We have the same freedoms as if we were staying in Pittsburgh for a week, as opposed to here."

Same thing for the Cardinals, whose coach, Ken Whisenhunt, was Pittsburgh's offensive coordinator for that fifth Super Bowl win. Whisenhunt understands the importance of sticking to the norms, even if this is more than uncharted territory for the Cardinals.

He also believes the week the Cardinals spent in the East in September, with back-to-back games in Washington and the Meadowlands, will be beneficial now. Even if Arizona lost both games.

"This is a week of distractions," he said, "and this is one distraction that is not new to us. It helps us minimize that distraction."

Regardless, both coaches, as well as veterans who have gotten this far - yes, the Cardinals have some players who made Super Bowl teams elsewhere, including quarterback Kurt Warner - can't stress enough the importance of not stressing too much.

"I'm just going to have fun and enjoy it," Roethlisberger said. "I don't know if it's my last one, you never know. I hope not. I hope I can come back to five more of these, but you just never know."

-- Barry Wilner

Hines Ward, Steelers not feeling Super Bowl heat

TAMPA, Fla. - Brett Keisel began sweating the minute he walked off the Pittsburgh Steelers' plane and into Florida's bright sunshine and warm weather.

It might be the only time this week the Steelers feel the heat of being favored to win a record sixth Super Bowl.

With injured wide receiver Hines Ward resting comfortably in his shipped-in hyperbaric chamber, the Steelers didn't seem the least bit bothered Monday by all the attention they're drawing for a game that can unnerve the most experienced of players.

Maybe it's because 20 of them, counting Ward and 10 other starters, played and won a Super Bowl three years ago in Detroit, where the weather was never as comfortable as it is in Tampa. Or maybe it's the three AFC title games and 10 playoff games many Steelers have been part of during the last five seasons.

While the Super Bowl is a whole new deal for the Arizona Cardinals, who have gone longer without a major pro sports championship (61 years) than any team except for the Chicago Cubs, the Steelers are accustomed to playing what coach Mike Tomlin calls January football.

Or, in this case, February football.

The Steelers also are encouraged that Ward - the player whose toughness and whatever-it-takes attitude defines the franchise - is certain he will play Sunday despite a sprained right knee. Ward was injured during the first quarter of the AFC championship game on Jan. 18.

He is undergoing strenuous rehabilitation, including a session in Pittsburgh on Monday morning before hopping on the Steelers' private charter. He may be on the field again as soon as Thursday's practice at the University of South Florida.

As quarterback Ben Roethlisberger said: This is Hines Ward, and how could the MVP of the only Steelers' Super Bowl victory in the last 29 years possibly miss a game so big?

Answer: He won't.

"People ask me that question and I want to smack them," Roethlisberger said. "It's Hines Ward, he's going to be out here. It's the Super Bowl."

No kidding. And that means honking horns outside the Steelers' hotel and twirling Terrible Towels, courtesy of the dozens and dozens of fans who've made it down here for the game.

"You have to take it with a smile and appreciate it all," Keisel said. "The chance to bring home Pittsburgh's sixth trophy, to me that's extremely exciting."

Unlike the Arizona players who wore suits for their first Super Bowl press conference, the Steelers came dressed in gear that appeared to be from the House of Reebok. Roethlisberger even wore a coach's shirt, something most players wouldn't dare do.

Super Bowl pressure? The Steelers?

"I'm going to enjoy it," Roethlisberger said. "I don't know if it's going to be my last one."

There's a better chance that Ward, who will be 33 in March, is playing in his last Super Bowl than the 26-year-old Roethlisberger. That's why Ward is doing everything possible to make sure the knee sprain doesn't prevent him from being on the field.

He even shipped a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to the team hotel - yes, just like the device Michael Jackson once used. Ward believes it stimulates the production of red blood cells and will hasten his recuperation from the same type of injury that benched running back Willie Parker for a month this season.

"I don't have a brace on, I'm walking around fine," Ward said. "I'm not going to be 100 percent. I'm not going to trick anybody. But I think I'm going to be able to go out there and perform like I'm used to."

A normal game for Ward is a half-dozen catches, a half-dozen punishing blocks and a half-dozen verbal skirmishes with opposing defensive backs.

"You look at it, you can be a part of history," Ward said. "It's something as a (Steelers) player - we envision going to the Super Bowl and winning it. We have a lot of veteran guys who experienced it. The adrenaline is going to be there."

The Steelers are fairly certain Ward is going to be there, too.

-- Alan Robinson

Warner hopes young Cards avoid Super Bowl pitfalls

TAMPA, Fla. - Kurt Warner is certain he won't be overwhelmed by everything that is the Super Bowl. Whether his young teammates will be is an open question.

"I think that's one of the things we all hope," Warner said, "but I think only time will tell."

Warner brought his Arizona Cardinals to Florida on Monday for the final frantic week before Sunday's game against Pittsburgh, a 37-year-old quarterback leading a squad that no one could have imagined would be here.

He knows his teammates might be tempted to celebrate a little. He also knows how foolish it would be to let something get in the way of an Arizona victory over the Steelers.

"The parties will come and go," Warner said, "but being a part of history is something that's special. I hope that guys embrace that."

Defensive end Bertrand Berry said the temptations are definitely there.

"I've been to a few of these, but only as a visitor," Berry said, adding: "I know that there are a lot of opportunities to get into trouble."

Warner, unlike nearly all his teammates, knows what it's like to win a Super Bowl, and to lose one. He was the game's MVP when the St. Louis Rams beat Tennessee in the 1999 season. He was back two years later, when the Rams lost to New England on Adam Vinatieri's last-second field goal.

Since then, Warner has lost starting jobs in St. Louis, New York and Arizona. He downplayed the triumphant nature of his return.

"Unlike probably the other two, and I think definitely the first one, this one up to this point was really like business as usual," he said. "I really felt like it was just another road trip. The whole Super Bowl thing hasn't hit me yet."

Arizona coach Ken Whisenhunt has been here before, too, as offensive coordinator of Pittsburgh's Super Bowl champions of three seasons ago.

"It's a little muggy out here," Whisenhunt said, "But fortunately we've got a week to get used to that."

They have much less time to get used to the media frenzy - it starts Tuesday - and they will lean on Warner's experience to get through it.

"Anytime you have a player that has Kurt's credentials, that has had the season that Kurt's had throughout this year, it commands respect," Whisenhunt said.

Though he wants his team to enjoy the experience, Whisenhunt said, "We can't lose sight of the fact that we're here to play a game."

He also knows that trouble is easy to find.

"I don't think you can talk to them about it enough," he said. "I've talked to them about it and will talk to them about this again. That's something that's very important. ... The only thing is give them as much information as you can about it. It really goes back to the type of players that we have. They've done a really good job of handling this so far."

He might have been talking about wide receiver Anquan Boldin.

"We are trying to go about it as a team preparing for another game," Boldin said. "We are trying to leave all of the hype and hoopla around it out of it, and try to prepare for it as much as possible."

The Cardinals have rolled up 95 points in playoff victories over Atlanta, Carolina and Philadelphia, heady stuff for a franchise that had two playoff victories its entire history before this year.

This isn't the first time the Cardinals have spent a week in the East. They stayed in suburban Washington after losing to the Redskins to prepare for the following Sunday's game against the New York Jets.

That didn't turn out so well. The Cardinals lost 56-35.

"This is a different type of week," Larry Fitzgerald said. "It's the Super Bowl and it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I think guys are really focused and ready to do what it takes, no matter if it's curfews, whatever it takes. Guys are ready and we'll be prepared."

-- Bob Baum

Joe Maddon's beloved Cardinals in Super Bowl

TAMPA, Fla. - Charley Johnson, Jim Hart, Neil Lomax, Jake Plummer, Bobby Joe Conrad, Sonny Randle, Larry Wilson, Jerry Stovall, Pat Fischer, Conrad Dobler, Dan Dierdorf, Terry Metcalf.

Joe Maddon was just getting started naming some of his favorite Cardinals of all time. The Tampa Bay Rays manager, who has a framed "No. 70" Arizona jersey hanging on the wall of his office, is ecstatic the team he's rooted for since 1963 is in the Super Bowl.

The appearance is especially sweet coming three months after he led the Rays' improbable run to the World Series, where the AL champions lost to the Philadelphia Phillies.

"I was a sick Cardinals football fan," said Maddon, a Hazelton, Pa., native who remembers the day he devoted himself to the Big Red, as well as the baseball Cardinals and NBA's Hawks, then located in St. Louis.

He and his father were leaving a White Sox-Yankees game in New York and stopped at a concession stand to purchase a hat. Maddon selected a navy blue Cardinals cap with a red insignia.

"At that moment I became a die-hard St. Louis fan," Maddon said. "It was simple as that."

The Cardinals shipped the prized jersey that hangs on Maddon's wall shortly after the manager was hired by Tampa Bay and revealed he had been a Cardinals fan for much of his life.

So what's more surprising, the Rays reaching the World Series or Arizona being in the NFL title game against the Pittsburgh Steelers?

"I'd say it's even more improbable that they did because people had recently talked about us getting to the point of being in the playoffs in the next couple of years," Maddon said. "I'd say to some extent the Cardinals are mentioned that way. But for them to get to the Super Bowl, I don't think that was really on anybody's radar screen."

Maddon, who lives in California during the offseason, had not planned to attend the Super Bowl. With the Cardinals here, though, the Rays hastily arranged to buy two tickets for the manager through the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Maddon hopes it's not the last big event on the horizon for his beloved teams. Asked if there was anything that could top Tampa Bay and Arizona competing for championships, he didn't hesitate.

"The Atlanta Hawks in the NBA Finals," Maddon said.

STEELERS HERITAGE

As the Pittsburgh Steelers seek to become the first team with six championships in the Super Bowl era, Troy Polamalu, their All-Pro safety, believes this team has a direct connection with the Steel Curtain teams that won four Super Bowls in six seasons during the 1970s.

"We're all tied to Jack Lambert," Polamalu said Monday, a reference to the Hall of Fame middle linebacker on those teams.

How?

Polamalu was a rookie with the Steelers in 2003, the last of the 10 seasons linebacker Jason Gildon was in Pittsburgh.

"It all ties together," he said. "I played with Jason Gildon. Jason Gildon was a teammate of someone who was a teammate of someone who was a teammate of someone who was a roommate of Jack Lambert."

LOVE THOSE CARDS

As a lifelong Arizona Cardinals fan, Jose Sanchez felt profound joy in watching his team land a spot in the Super Bowl after years of mediocrity. He ranks the moment alongside the birth of his first son.

Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Sanchez said he would get into home games by scooping up tickets that had been discarded at halftime by fans frustrated with the Cardinals' play. At a rally Monday for the team, Sanchez dressed in all crimson and proudly displayed the tattoo across his chest that bears the name of his home state.

The Cardinals, long the league's doormat franchise with just one winning season in the last 24 years, earned their first playoff berth since 1998 and first divisional title since they won the NFC East in 1975.

The frustration of many failed seasons washed away during the NFC championship game that sent the Cardinals to the Super Bowl.

"It's like being a bum and then becoming a millionaire the next day," said Sanchez, a 29-year-old from Tempe who works as a manager for an auto glass company.

More than 1,000 fans, some carrying signs that read "Shock the World!" gathered at Phoenix's Sky Harbor airport to see off the Cardinals as they headed to Tampa for Sunday's game against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

NICE SCHEDULE

Pittsburgh's Mike Tomlin began his NFL coaching career as an assistant coach under Tony Dungy with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and won a Super Bowl ring with the Bucs as part of Jon Gruden's staff six years ago.

But there's been little he could draw from Tampa Bay's preparation for the NFL title to help the Steelers get ready to face the Cardinals because there was only one week - instead of the usual two - between the conference championship games and the Super Bowl in January 2003.

"There was a lot of hustle and bustle, if you will," Tomlin said. "The two-week schedule, I think, worked in our favor in terms of creating a little normalcy."

In addition to being able to install the game plan and maintain their customary practice schedule in Pittsburgh last week, Tomlin said the Steelers should benefit from being the "visiting" team because Pittsburgh's sessions with the media will follow daily interviews with the Cardinals.

"That's allowed us to pretty much maintain a pretty normal schedule in terms of how we approach our business here this week," Tomlin said. "During the season we meet in the morning at 9 o'clock as a team and we kind of go from there. We intend to do the same thing here."

Cardinals media sessions on Wednesday and Thursday will begin at 8 a.m. EST. That's 6 a.m. back home in Phoenix. Steelers interviews begin at 11 a.m.

WATCH YOUR MONEY

New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees and Tampa Bay running back Warrick Dunn joined a group of high school students in playing "Financial Football," a computer-based game designed to educate teenagers about the importance of money management skills.

The players talked to the youngsters about their personal experiences, noting they would have benefited from such a program if it had been available to them during high school or college.

"Save your money, live within your means," Brees urged, adding that it's important to know how to handle money whether you're making minimum wage or millions.

"You look at the economic times today, it's tough for everybody," Dunn said. "If you can manage your money, you can get through those times."

The students were divided into two teams, with Brees leading the Cardinals and Dunn coaching the Steelers. The football is advanced by providing correct answers to multiple choice questions.

The game ended in a 7-7 tie.

-- Fred Goodall

Longest week in sports, and then they hold a game

TAMPA, Fla. - The longest week in sports officially kicked off Monday with this less than startling revelation:

The Arizona Cardinals seem to dress better than the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Granted, the survey in this case consisted of just five players from each team and their respective head coaches. But it was clear from looking at Kurt Warner's salmon-colored tie and the expensive suit Larry Fitzgerald was wearing that the Cardinals take their sartorial responsibilities far more seriously than their opponents, who showed up for their first media gathering in sweats and golf shirts.

That alone probably wasn't enough to prompt the bookies in Las Vegas to change the betting line, which has held steady at 7 points almost from the time it was posted last week. If fashion style points mattered in football, Michael Strahan would have had a lot more rings to go with the one he won last year with the New York Giants.

But this is Super Bowl week, and fans are starved for inside information. They must be, or else hundreds of writers, photographers and cameramen wouldn't have bothered to bolster the Tampa Bay economy by getting here early enough to record the first utterances of this, the 43rd Super Bowl.

What did we learn, other than Steelers' coach Mike Tomlin looks a lot better in his sideline gear than he does in what looked like a leisure suit from Pittsburgh's dynasty years of the 1970s.

Plenty, because all we had to do was ask.

Let's start with Warner, who plans to lead by example this week and show his younger teammates how to handle the pressure of the big game. Well, not the big game itself, but the media appearances they make to hype a game that is never supposed to need any hype.

Warner has been through it twice, and is determined not to show any fear in the face of the notebooks, microphones and cameras pointed his way.

"If you start panicking," Warner said, "they start panicking."

Apparently defensive end Bertrand Berry didn't get the memo because he began fighting his emotions after fans gathered to give the team a send-off at the Phoenix airport.

"It's overwhelming when you start to think about it," said Berry, who couldn't have thought much about it much before because he plays for the downtrodden Cardinals, after all.

Things seemed a little calmer in the Pittsburgh tent, where Troy Polamalu had his famous hair neatly pulled back in a ponytail, Tomlin had already held a team meeting, and Ben Roethlisberger talked about how different things seem this time around than when he nervously quarterbacked the Steelers to their fifth Super Bowl win a few years ago in icy Detroit.

Twenty Steelers from that team will be on the field Sunday, which might prove more significant than their fashion sense because the Cardinals have only five players with Super Bowl experience.

"I'm going to have fun, going to enjoy this because it may be my last," Roethlisberger said. "I hope I have five more, but you just never know."

Indeed, the players are perhaps the only variable in a weeklong dance the NFL choreographs to the minute before the teams finally take the field Sunday night to give Americans a much-needed respite from worrying about the economy collapsing around them.

All signs of the impending game are already in place, from the throngs of media to the Goodyear blimp floating lazily overhead. Security forces were promising a safe game, while party planners were promising fun to all lucky enough to get an invite to the festivities around town.

Still, the economic meltdown threatens to cut into the fun.

The Super Bowl is the ultimate corporate event, but with companies laying off workers by the thousands it's hard to justify sending executives to the game. Newspapers in dire straits are sending fewer reporters, if any, this year, and the NFL did something unheard of to make sure the stadium is full, dropping the price of a block of 1,000 game tickets from $800 to $500.

None of that mattered much Monday, when everyone seemed excited just to get the week going. For the newcomers it was just a taste of what will happen on Tuesday when all players and coaches are required to attend hour-long media gatherings at the stadium that sometimes border on the bizarre.

It was there last year that a Mexican TV reporter in a wedding dress got the scoop of the week when she asked Patriots coach Bill Belichick if she was more attractive than model Gisele Bundchen, Tom Brady's squeeze.

"I wouldn't go that far," Belichick said.

Tim Dahlberg is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at tdahlbergap.org

Anonymous former players make for Super coaches

TAMPA, Fla. - Mike Tomlin was a standout player in college. He set a couple of school records. He was on the all-conference team.

This was at William & Mary - a long way from the big time. The NFL took a pass on him, deciding it didn't need a receiver from the Yankee Conference who was probably a step slower than the guys coming out of the SEC and Big 10.

Not to worry. Tomlin's resume was just right for becoming a super coach. As in Super Bowl.

"It's really quite simple," he said Monday, shortly after arriving in Tampa as the man in charge of the AFC champion Pittsburgh Steelers. "Those that can't - teach. I certainly fall into that category. I started coaching because I could no longer play."

Tomlin is in good company. From Vince Lombardi to Tom Coughlin, the Super Bowl's coaching lineup is dominated by those who never played the game, at least at the highest level.

While each storyline is different, there's a common theme throughout:

What they lacked in athletic ability they tried to make up for by lingering on the practice field longer than anyone else, spending extra hours in the film room and poring over the playbook as if it were a final exam.

Granted, all that extra work still wasn't enough to propel them to NFL stardom. But it did teach them a thing or two about running a team on the sidelines - from hiring the best assistants to dealing with egos of all shapes and sizes.

"Certainly there are things that come easy for some players," said plucky receiver Sean Morey of the Arizona Cardinals, the team that will face Tomlin's Steelers in the season's decisive game. "But the athlete that has to work a little bit harder and study a little bit more - I kind of think of myself like that - we have to make sure we study the game to the nth degree so we understand exactly what we're trying to accomplish."

Tomlin's counterpart, Ken Whisenhunt, actually had a playing career of some renown compared with most who've reached the NFL's coaching pinnacle. He was a 12th-round pick of the Atlanta Falcons - No. 313 overall - and hung around the league for nearly a decade, a tight end known mostly for doling out a mean block.

But he, too, spent a lot of time watching, observing, learning. One of his biggest influences was center Jeff Van Note, whose 18-year tenure with the Falcons made him one of the league's longest-lasting players.

"I learned the importance of taking notes and being aware of what's going on around you," Whisenhunt recalled.

When his playing career ended, the transition to coaching came naturally. Like many assistants, Whisenhunt bounced from job to job during those early years while getting a chance to work under myriad coaching styles and philosophies.

Finally, he landed in Pittsburgh with Bill Cowher, working his way up to offensive coordinator and helping the Steelers win a Super Bowl title.

"I had a great influence in coach Cowher as far as how to handle a team and how to deal with a lot of things that go with it," Whisenhunt said. "It's just been a collection of those things that I've kind of used as a model to go forward with this team."

A few star players have made the transition to successful coach. Forrest Gregg was a nine-time Pro Bowler who guided Cincinnati to its first Super Bowl. Tom Landry was a star cornerback for the New York Giants before he traded his helmet for the more-familiar fedora, becoming one of the most successful coaches in NFL history. Barely remembered after he guided Pittsburgh to four Super Bowl titles was the fact that Chuck Noll spent seven years playing defense in Cleveland, picking off five passes in 1955.

The granddaddy of all Super Bowls when it comes to star players-turned-coaches was 1986, when Chicago's Mike Ditka faced New England's Raymond Berry. As players, they combined for 11 Pro Bowl appearances. Berry was a star receiver on the great Baltimore teams of the late 1950s and early '60s. Ditka was a first-round pick who helped redefine the tight end position into something more than a glorified lineman.

But that was an anomaly. The prevailing tone was set in the very first Super Bowl, when Green Bay's legendary Lombardi - whose post-college playing career consisted of stints with the semipro Brooklyn Eagles and Wilmington Clippers - faced Kansas City's Hank Stram, who abandoned the field for the sideline as soon as he was done matriculating.

Through the years, there's been the occasional Dan Reeves - who had a solid pro career with the Cowboys, then guided four teams to the Super Bowl. But there are far more coaches, such as the New York Giants' Coughlin and New England's Bill Belichick, who met in last year's NFL title game, with nary a game between them in an NFL uniform.

And now, Tomlin vs. Whisenhunt.

"I just think they have a greater understanding of the game," Steelers defensive end Brett Keisel said. "They might not be the best athletes. But they know where they should have been or shouldn't have been. They all have a great love of the game, how it's played and the way they feel it should be played."

Don't look for that trend to change, either. When it comes to being a Super Bowl coach, the prevailing motto is: No playing experience required.

These days, the stars can walk away from the game as millionaires, with little desire or need to take a hefty pay cut so they can endure the grueling hours and intense pressure of being an NFL coach. Just ask Pittsburgh's star receiver, Hines Ward, who played numerous positions in college and now comes across as sort of a playing coach.

Does he want to make that role official in a few years?

"I don't know," moaned the MVP of Pittsburgh's last Super Bowl victory, shaking his head slowly. "With the hours they put in, I don't think I want to be a coach.

"But," he quickly added, "I can get into commentating. I'm waiting for ESPN to call."

-- Paul Newberry

Road to Super Bowl XLIII flanked by 43 strip clubs

TAMPA, Fla. - There's Lip Stixx and Centerfolds and the Bliss Cabaret.

There's Diamond Dolls and Bare Assets and the Wild Gentlemen's Club.

In fact, there are, by one count, 43 strip clubs in the Tampa metropolitan area - one for each Super Bowl. And the week of Super Bowl XLIII is to Tampa's naughty nightlife what Black Friday is to America's shopping malls.

All the exotic dancing joints have earned Tampa a bawdy reputation - the lads' magazine Maxim even put it on its top 10 list of best U.S. party cities a couple years ago, based mostly on the two score and more night spots to see naked or nearly naked women.

Now, with at least one spot planning to have a tent in the parking lot to handle the overflow of free-spending tourists, locals expect to profit mightily through kickoff Sunday evening.

"Based on what we did last Super Bowl (in 2001), the numbers will quadruple during that weekend," says Nick Polefrone, general manager of 2001 Odyssey, a landmark club known for the spaceship-shaped VIP room rising from the top of the building.

Across the street is Mons Venus, a joint that is listed among the best strip clubs in the world by users of a Web site called The Ultimate Strip Club List. The two upscale clubs - walking distance from Raymond James Stadium, where the Arizona Cardinals will play the Pittsburgh Steelers - have been fixtures for decades. Polefrone figures Tampa's naughty national image grew out from there.

"Tampa has a reputation for having the most strip clubs and the most girls who are a lot of fun," says a 25-year-old exotic dancer named Claudia, who left her usual gig in Las Vegas to work the Super Bowl week here. (She asked that her last name not be used to save her family any embarrassment.)

Claudia says she's worked four previous Super Bowls and expects to make as much as $2,000 a day performing at 2001 Odyssey. Most clubs treat the dancers as independent contractors who pay a flat fee to the house and keep the rest.

"It's so crazy, everybody is in a such a party mood," she says. "It's a whole new level of everything."

The clubs have been busy auditioning more dancers and upgrading their interiors. Some will stay open 24 hours.

The Tampa Tribune helpfully added a feature to its Web site listing the 43 strip clubs and allowing Super Bowl visitors to search for such information as the cover charge and dress code.

Tired of Tampa's sleazy reputation, local lawmakers passed an anti-lap-dance ordinance before the last Super Bowl here in 2001, making it a misdemeanor offense for dancers to come within six feet of patrons. The measure got a lot of publicity, but police didn't arrest anybody during Super Bowl week.

Police spokeswoman Andrea Davis says officers won't be patrolling the clubs looking for dancers who get too close this time, but they'll be obliged to investigate if someone calls in a complaint.

"Our primary focus during the Super Bowl is going to be public safety," she says.

Bob Buckhorn, a former city councilman who pushed the six-foot ordinance, laments that the adult entertainment industry is "ingrained in the fabric of this community." The point of the law, he says, was to attack prostitution and prevent other crime by trying to keep guys away from those places. He wishes it was more aggressively enforced today.

"It's like cockroaches," Buckhorn says. "If you don't stay on top of it, it will infect and run you over. And that's exactly what's happened."

To the city's promoters, Tampa's image as the Lap Dance Capital of America is not exactly something to tout in the glossy brochures. Travis Claytor, spokesman for Tampa Bay & Co., the tourism bureau, would rather point out other attractions, such as:

- Beaches. Some of the best white-sand beaches anywhere are a half-hour or so from downtown. Two of them - Fort DeSoto Park and Caladesi Island - have topped the list from Stephen P. Leatherman, a Florida International University professor dubbed "Dr. Beach" for his annual rankings of the nation's best coastlines.

- Ybor City. The historic former Latin quarter east of downtown is a thriving entertainment district whose nightclubs will host some of the glitziest, celebrity-heavy Super Bowl parties. (There's a strip club there, too, of course.)

- Cigars. In the early 20th century, more cigars were made in Tampa than anywhere in the world, by Cuban immigrants. The city retains a rich cigar heritage, and some shops are still rolling them right on the premises.

But in the end, a lot of visitors will still be packing the clubs at night.

"It's not necessarily a negative thing, it's just one aspect of this destination," the judicious Claytor says. "There is so much more to our area than that particular industry."

-- Mitch Stacy

NFL: Super Bowl security to be tight in Tampa

TAMPA, Fla. - At least 20 federal agencies will help local police secure Raymond James Stadium for Sunday's Super Bowl, with duties ranging from protecting airspace and the port to arresting peddlers of counterfeit souvenirs, officials said Monday.

Because of the massive security effort, the stadium "is one of the safest locations you can possibly be on Super Bowl Sunday in the United States of America," said Milton E. Ahlerich, the NFL's vice president for security.

The heavy security will be typical of every Super Bowl since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Ahlerich said at a news conference. There is no evidence of any nefarious plans by terrorists, he said, but the high profile of the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Arizona Cardinals makes it "an attractive target."

Officials declined to say how many personnel will be involved in protecting the stadium and fans.

The security plan has been nearly two years in the making.

Virginia O'Brien, special agent-in-charge of the Tampa office of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said some of the people working the game were also involved in last week's presidential inauguration in Washington and last year's World Series.

"Like every team that makes it to the Super Bowl, we've all been working together and we've been planning and training for almost two years to work together," O'Brien said.

Ahlerich cautioned fans to watch out for counterfeit tickets, which is a problem at every Super Bowl. They need to get to the game early and bring very little with them. Security will be similar to airports - long lines, metal detectors, a bag check and a pat-down.

Tampa police Maj. John Bennett noted that the city hosted the last Super Bowl before the 2001 terrorist attacks. The security plan and presence has had to change right along with the increased threat.

"The event has become so large and so glamorous, it just has a unique footprint that we didn't see in 2001," he said. 

-- Mitch Stacy