Giants' home-field advantage bad news for rest of NFC

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Earth, Wind and Luck.

Brandon Jacobs punishes the Panthers with three touchdowns. (Getty Images)

Those three elements have the New York Giants home for the playoffs, and just in the nick of time. The team that had seemed to have lost its identity when it subtracted star receiver Plaxico Burress earlier this month pulled itself together for its most important victory of the season.

I'm talking, of course, of that 34-28 overtime defeat of Carolina, a victory that clinched home-field advantage for the Giants and demonstrated that it's wrong to dismiss Big Blue from talk of a Super Bowl repeat.

I know, I know, they haven't looked all that imposing lately. Big deal. They did when it mattered most Sunday, and that's where Earth, Wind and Luck came into play.

The Earth you know about. It's supposed to be running back/piledriver Brandon Jacobs, who scored three times, but it could just as well be the Giants' rushing attack. It's the best in the league, and it shredded Carolina for a season-high 301 yards -- including all 87 on the game-winning drive.

The Wind? That's Derrick Ward, the running back who sits behind Jacobs. Normally, you don't hear much about him. But on this evening he ran for a career-best 215 yards -- including dashes of 51, 14 and 17 on the Giants' last drive -- and wore out Carolina's front seven.

And the Luck? Well, it's always good to have some when you need it, and the Giants cashed in when John Kasay -- who missed only one field goal all season -- and a stiff breeze combined to push a game-winning field goal wide left with four seconds left in regulation.

"I think we played ourselves back into playing good football again," winning coach Tom Coughlin said.

And that's the point. In overcoming Carolina, all three elements have made it difficult for anyone to topple the Giants in the NFC playoffs. Here's why: With the Giants winning, it is Carolina that loses out in the home-field edge department ... and that's a big deal, maybe bigger than you might imagine.

Carolina hasn't lost at home. In fact, the Panthers are 8-0. But they're 3-4 on the road and just blew a 21-10 lead to New York in a game that meant everything to them.

"Disappointing would be putting it mildly," said losing quarterback Jake Delhomme.

The Giants, meanwhile, are 7-1 at home, losing only to Philadelphia. A year ago they were 3-5 at home and won a Super Bowl. If home-field advantage is not what they needed, it is what they wanted. And now they have it.

"I don't think it's the end of the world if we didn't have home-field advantage," Eli Manning said. "But it was a big win.