In one of the most significant upsets in Super Bowl history, the NFC champion New York Giants (14-6) defeated the AFC champion New England Patriots (18-1) by the score of 17-14.Had the Patriots won this game, they would have completed a the first perfect season in the NFL since the 1972 Miami Dolphins and the only one since the league expanded to a 16-game regular season in 1978.

The game was a rematch of both teams’ regular season-ending game on December 29, 2007, which the Patriots won to finish the regular season 16–0, with a score of 38–35 at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

New England opened the bye week as 14-point favorites, but dipped to 12-point favorites by kickoff. In the end, after falling behind late in the fourth quarter, the Giants won 17–14 on a final-minute touchdown pass from Eli Manning to Plaxico Burress. Manning was named the Most Valuable Player and the Giants became the first NFC wild card team to win a Super Bowl.

The telecast was the most-watched Super Bowl in history, with an average of 97.5 million viewers in the United States. A record 148.3 million total viewers tuned into the game. It was also the second-most-watched TV program in the United States, behind the 1983 M*A*S*H series finale.