Super Bowl XL 2006 Season Betting Picks, Tips & Odds

The divisional round of the playoffs are over, leaving four NFL teams to pair off for two spots in the Super Bowl. As far as the league is concerned, it's the most wonderful time of the year. Smiles and high fives all around. It is a wonderful time of the year. The just-completed weekend - eight teams, four games - is one of the top sports weekends of the year. Next, there are championship games and the Super Bowl.

The AFC and NFC Championships are set after a wild Divisional Playoff weekend. In the AFC, the road-tested Pittsburgh Steelers travel to Denver to battle the Broncos, who are undefeated at home. Later, the Seattle Seahawks host the Carolina Panthers in a fight for the NFC crown.

Pittsburgh Steelers

After beating the mighty Indianapolis Colts, the surging Pittsburgh Steelers try to win on the road once more as the Steelers take their vaunted "blitz of steel" at Denver in the AFC Championship game against the Broncos.

This will be Pittsburgh's sixth AFC title game in 12 seasons. But this also will be its first of those on the road, not necessarily a bad thing, considering that the Steelers are 1-4 at home in those previous championships. They are the first sixth-seeded team to reach a championship game since the NFL went to the current lineup of six playoff teams from each conference in 1990.

But they are no ordinary sixth seed. Remember that they were 15-1 last season and lost to New England in the championship game at Heinz Field, no disgrace given what the Patriots have been doing this century. And remember that they started 7-2, and seemed headed for a division title and no worse than a second or third seed when Ben Roethlisberger hurt a knee and then a thumb and they lost three straight.

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Denver Broncos

The Denver Broncos (13-3), who snapped the Patriots’ NFL record 10-game postseason winning streak last week, host the Pittsburgh Steelers (11-5) in the AFC Championship Game on Sunday looking to advance to the Super Bowl for the seventh time in team history at INVESCO Field at Mile High, where the Broncos have won their last 11 games to tie for the NFL’s longest current such streak.

Denver defeated the two-time defending Super Bowl Champion Patriots 27-13 on Saturday night and hosts a Steelers team that became the first No. 6 seed to advance to the conference championship after defeating the Colts 21-18 on Sunday. The victor advances to Super Bowl XL in Detroit on Feb. 5 to face the winner of the NFC title game featuring Carolina playing at Seattle.

Sunday’s game will be a rematch of the 1997 AFC Championship Game in which the Broncos earned a 24-21 road victory against the Steelers en route to winning Super Bowl XXXII. The Broncos have faced the Steelers more than any other postseason opponent and will look to improve their 3-2 (.600) all-time record in those games.

Denver has never lost a home AFC Championship Game, compiling a 4-0 record in those contests. Denver’s overall record in the conference title game stands at 6-1 (.857), which ranks as the third-best winning percentage in the NFL since the 1970 merger among teams with at least three championship game appearances.

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Carolina Panthers

First it was the NFC East champions New York Giants. Then the NFC North champions Chicago Bears. Next week, the Carolina Panthers will try for a road trifecta as they travel to Seattle to face the offensive minded Seahawks for a place in Super Bowl XL.

Under John Fox, the Panthers have now won four playoff games on the road in three seasons. The only other team that has won more than one during Fox's tenure is Pittsburgh, which won its second road contest earlier in the day at Indianapolis. Should the Panthers be able to win a fifth this Sunday, they will appear in Super Bowl XL as the NFC representative for the second time in three years.

The difference maker, at least so far, has been wide receiver Steve Smith, who scored the first touchdown in both playoff games. Smith has ignited the offense and taken pressure off the running game, which has allowed both halves of the offense to play against an honest defense. Smith says the formula is simple, and he hopes the team doesn't stray from it.

In 2003, Carolina defeated then-NFC powerhouses St. Louis and Philadelphia in their houses. This season, they have been rude guests in New York and Chicago. They have shut down high octane offenses (Rams and Giants), and outscored tough defenses (Eagles and Bears).

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Seattle Seahawks

On paper, this is a matchup between Seattle's offense and Carolina's defense - the Seahawks led the NFL this season with 452 points. But that can be simplistic - the Panthers and Bears both moved the ball well in a game that was supposed to end up something like 6-3 or 10-6 instead of a contest with 50 points and 716 yards between the two teams.

It's also a matchup between two of the NFL's more underrated quarterbacks - Carolina's Jake Delhomme (5-1 in the playoffs in his career) and Seattle's Matt Hasselbeck, both Pro Bowlers. Delhomme threw for 319 yards and three TDs in Chicago; Hasselbeck carried the Seahawks after Alexander went out in the first quarter.

But the offensive players to watch will be two All-Pros - Alexander, assuming he plays, and Carolina's Steve Smith, the league's leading receiver. Smith had 12 catches for 218 yards and two TDs in Chicago and sometimes seems impossible to stop no matter what the coverage - he's skilled at turning short screens into long gains and also is threat on the reverse.

The home field should be an edge for Seattle. The Seahawks are 9-0 at Qwest Field, one of the noisiest venues in the league - indoors or out. But Carolina won the NFC title two seasons ago in Philadelphia, another tough home field.

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