Sports

Super Bowl XLII Diary: Saturday

PHOENIX (CBS) ― Abigail Lorge, the national sports producer for the CBS Television Stations digital media group, is providing a running diary from Super Bowl XLII. 

Saturday, Feb. 2, 6:00 p.m. MT
Experiencing "NFL Experience"

Just got back from the visiting the "NFL Experience" - a ginormous theme-park area adjacent to University of Phoenix Stadium where thousands of football fans were getting their football fix a day early.

The "experience" included a Super Bowl history exhibition, loads of memorabilia, the Vince Lombardi trophy (closely guarded), skills clinics, and several passing, running, blocking and agility games. For the little tykes who weren't quite ready to put on the pads, there was an area for dressing up teddy bears in NFL uniforms.

Speaking of little tykes, check out 7-week-old baby "Brady" in the adjacent video. He was born in early December, and is already decked out in a customized onesie that honors his favorite QB - and namesake.


Saturday, Feb. 2, 12:00 p.m. MT
About Last Night...

I've spent the last couple of evenings in Scottsdale, the social center of this year's Super Bowl as well as site of the Patriots team hotel - the posh Westin Kierland Resort.

The Giants, conversely, have holed up in the desert, far removed from any distractions, at the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass in Chandler, Ariz.

Most bars and restaurants in the DC Ranch district where I was last night have been packed because Scottsdale is hosting more than just Super Bowl-related glitterati this week.

The FBR Open, which boasts the biggest crowds on the PGA Tour, also is taking place this weekend at the TPC Scottsdale, and hometown hero Phil Mickelson is three strokes off the lead through two rounds.

The top celeb sighting of the day was a slightly haggard-looking Adrian Grenier at the exclusive Phoenician Resort

My own little entourage opted not to brave the Maxim magazine party, the night's hottest social event, mostly because we were too old and wearing too much clothing.

Instead, we were happy to hang out in the Market Street area in Scottsdale, where among the current and former athletes milling about were Scottsdale resident Amy Van Dyken, an Olympic champion swimmer, and her husband Tom Rouen, who won two Super Bowls as the punter for the Denver Broncos.

When I got back to Phoenix, around the time when the annual Super Bowl Gospel Celebration concert was getting out of Symphony Hall, I stopped by a downtown bar teeming with Giants and Pats fans.

New York supporters packed one side of the establishment while New England peeps stayed on the other; there was a clear line of delineation - the bar itself - in between. I was content to drink my beer in the neutral zone.


Saturday, Feb. 2, 9:00 a.m. MT
Small World For Patriots Nation

My small world story du jour: Yesterday I ran into a pair of Patriots fans who had just arrived in Phoenix for the big game.

The couple, Crystal and Gary Pontbriand of Worcester, Mass., used to live in my hometown of Paxton (population: roughly 4,000, not including cows) in central Massachusetts.

It's not often you travel 3,000 miles across the country and encounter someone from your own point of origin - particularly when that town is small enough to have more farms (two) than traffic lights (one).

Gary has been a Patriots season ticket-holder since 1970, back when New England played in the original Foxborough Stadium. He's been to every Super Bowl the Pats have played, and did not entertain the possibility the team would have any trouble winning their fourth title in seven years.

"They didn't come this far to lose here," he said. "That's not the way the Patriots do it."

As for tickets, the Pontbriands paid face value - $900 a pop - for their club-level seats.

Funny to think that on Sunday, among the 73,000 people packed into University of Phoenix Stadium, will be three people from a Massachusetts town whose entire population could fit in one section.

(© MMVIII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)