Super Bowl Hangover Pt. 3: Eli's Elite Pace

By Scott Kacsmar
Cold, Hard Football Facts hangover remedy

To conclude our little Super Bowl Hangover of data, it’s one final look at Eli Manning and his excellent 2011 season. As if there wasn’t enough material for Captain Comeback this week, there are some more milestones to pass on.
 
Thanks to a NFL record-tying 7^th fourth quarter comeback and 8^th game-winning drive of the season, Eli Manning now sits in good company with the all-time leaders through their first eight seasons in each category:
 

Most 4th Quarter Comeback Wins (First 8 Seasons)

Rk	QB	Years	4QC
1T	Johnny Unitas	1956-63	21
1T	Eli Manning	2004-11	21
3T	Tom Brady	2000-07	20
3T	Ben Roethlisberger	2004-11	20
5	Peyton Manning	1998-05	19
6T	John Elway	1983-90	18
6T	Jim Kelly	1986-93	18

 

Most Game-Winning Drives (first 8 seasons)

Rk	QB	Years	GWD
1	Tom Brady	2000-07	28
2	Ben Roethlisberger	2004-11	26
3T	Johnny Unitas	1956-63	25
3T	Dan Marino	1983-90	25
3T	Jake Plummer	1997-04	25
3T	Peyton Manning	1998-05	25
3T	Eli Manning	2004-11	25

Eli is tied with Johnny Unitas for the most comeback wins (21) in a player’s first eight seasons, and tied with four more for third place in game-winning drives.
 
For Eli, any time you can be on a list with the likes of Unitas, Dan Marino, Tom Brady, your brother Peyton Manning, your 2004 draft classmate Ben Roethlisberger, you know you’re in good shape. Yes, even with Jake Plummer. If you followed Plummer’s career, even back to his days at Arizona State, you understand how he gets on here.
 
We mentioned Sunday was the 15^th game-winning drive in Super Bowl history. Here is a list of those game-winning drives, and you can see the younger Manning has led two of the longest, latest, and best ones ever.
 

Super Bowl: Game-Winning Drive Stats

Super Bowl	Team	QB	Opponent	Score	Down	Time Start	DL	QB Stats	Time End
V (1970)	Baltimore	Earl Morrall	Dallas	FG	0	0:59	3	None accumulated	0:05
X (1975)	Pittsburgh	Terry Bradshaw	Dallas	FG	1	11:28	25	1 carry, 8 yards	8:41
XIV (1979)	Pittsburgh	Terry Bradshaw	LA Rams	TD	2	12:59	75	1/2 for 73 yards, TD	12:04
XVII (1982)	Washington	Joe Theismann	Miami	TD	4	11:43	52	None accumulated	10:01
XXIII (1988)	San Francisco	Joe Montana	Cincinnati	TD	3	3:10	92	8/9 for 97 yards, TD	0:34
XXV (1990)	NY Giants	Jeff Hostetler	Buffalo	FG	2	14:52	74	4/6 for 50 yards	7:20
XXXII (1997)	Denver	John Elway	Green Bay	TD	0	3:27	49	1/1 for 23 yards	1:45
XXXIV (1999)	St. Louis	Kurt Warner	Tennessee	TD	0	2:12	73	1/1 for 73 yards, TD	1:54
XXXVI (2001)	New England	Tom Brady	St. Louis	FG	0	1:21	53	5/8 for 53 yards	0:00
XXXVIII (2003)	New England	Tom Brady	Carolina	FG	0	1:08	37	4/5 for 47 yards	0:04
XXXIX (2004)	New England	Tom Brady	Philadelphia	TD	0	18:35	66	4/4 for 37 yards	13:44
XLII (2007)	NY Giants	Eli Manning	New England	TD	4	2:39	83	5/9 for 77 yards, TD	0:35
XLIII (2008)	Pittsburgh	Ben Roethlisberger	Arizona	TD	3	2:30	78	5/7 for 84 yards, TD	0:35
XLIV (2009)	New Orleans	Drew Brees	Indianapolis	TD	1	10:39	59	7/7 for 44 yards, TD	5:42
XLVI (2011)	NY Giants	Eli Manning	New England	TD	2	3:46	88	5/6 for 74 yards	0:57

 
Eli’s 77 yards (XLII) and 74 yards (XLVI) passing on the drives only rank behind Joe Montana (97) and Ben Roethlisberger (84) in terms of a quarterback’s passing contribution to the drive. His drives gaining a net 88 and 83 yards make them the second and third longest behind Montana’s 92-yard march against Cincinnati.
 
You can see only twice did a team actually need a touchdown on the game-winning drive. Joe Theismann simply handed off to John Riggins for a huge touchdown on fourth down, while Manning did his part to knock off the undefeated Patriots late in the game.
 
Eli has beaten New England the last three meetings with a long touchdown drive in the final minute. You can say the Manning brothers have a bit of a monopoly on leading long touchdown drives to win games.
 
Here is a list of notable active quarterbacks ranked by how many game-winning touchdown drives of 80+ yards they have led in their careers:
 

80+ Yard Game-Winning TD Drives

Rk	QB	80+ YD GW TD's
1	Peyton Manning	12
2	Eli Manning	7
3	Drew Brees	6
4	Ben Roethlisberger	5
4	Jay Cutler	5
6	Matt Ryan	4
7	Matthew Stafford	3
7	Alex Smith	3
7	Philip Rivers	3
7	Tom Brady	3
11	Mark Sanchez	2
11	Matt Schaub	2
11	Tony Romo	2
11	Michael Vick	2
15	Joe Flacco	1
16	Aaron Rodgers	0

 
With Peyton’s future up in the air, it’s hard to believe it might be Eli Manning (31 years old) that one day breaks Dan Marino’s records for fourth quarter comeback wins (36) and game-winning drives (51).
 
As Captain Comeback takes a much-needed break, he’ll soon be back with more football facts colder than this impostor posing as winter, and harder than Jimmy Johnson after an Extenze commercial.
 
Scott Kacsmar is a football researcher/writer who has contributed large quantities of data to Pro-Football-Reference.com, including the only standardized database of fourth quarter comebacks and game-winning drives. He plans to fill the new-football-less void with Skyrim for the time being. You can send any questions or comments to Scott at smk_42@yahoo.com and you can follow him on Twitter at @CaptainComeback.

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Read more: Ben Roethlisberger, Captain Comeback, Eli Manning, Fourth Quarter Comebacks, Game-Winning Drives, Jake Plummer, Johnny Unitas, New York Giants, NFL, Peyton Manning, Terry Bradshaw, Tom Brady