For a moment, it looked like another chapter was about to be written into the storied legacy of the Green Bay Packers and Lambeau Field. All the elements were in place to add the storybook tale of "Ice Bowl, Part II."

Bart Starr's plunge over the goal line would be joined in Packers' lore by Brett Favre, leading a comeback in similarly-frigid temperatures to earn a berth in the Super Bowl.

Everything seemed to follow the script when Lawrence Tynes missed a 36-yard field goal -- his second flub of the day -- as time expired to send the NFC Championship to overtime. The Green Bay Packers, considered by so many so-called "experts" to be a team of destiny, would get another chance to advance to Super Bowl XLII and won the overtime coin toss.

It wasn't meant to be.

On the second play of overtime, Favre threw an interception to New York's Corey Webster. Three plays later, the Giants -- behind a 47-yard field goal from Tynes -- walked off the frozen tundra with a 23-20 victory and a date with the 18-0 New England Patriots on Feb. 3 in Arizona.

After all that hype, all the build-up and all the manufactured drama ... the season that once had so much promise and proved so many people wrong ended the way that many thought it would unfold all along. The Packers were doomed from the start thanks a nearly non-existent running game and a defensive secondary whose hands-on nature and athletic shortcomings finally came back to haunt them.

In the beginning of the season, people looked at the Packers success and wondered if they would be able to survive late in the season and during the playoffs without a running game.

They weren't.

For all the attention given to Ryan Grant before the game, the feel-good story of Grant handing his old team of defeat never came to fruition; he carried the ball just 13 times for 29 yards, posting an abysmal average of 2.2 yards per carry. His longest run of the day came with about 1:17 left in the third and was good for 13 yards.

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Related links:

• Official NFL Game Summary (PDF)

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