Porter sure to be Sainted for his latest big interception

MIAMI -- Saints cornerback Tracy Porter missed the first players' bus to Sun Life Stadium on Sunday. He nearly missed the second one, too.

He didn't oversleep and he wasn't cramming in extra film study on Colts quarterback Peyton Manning.

He needed a haircut.

Porter called his personal hair stylist for a last-minute special Super Bowl XLIV trim. The left side of his head read "SB 44." The back side was the Louisiana Superdome. A road attached the Superdome to the Lombardi Trophy that was groomed on the right said of his melon.

"This is just the Superdome with a road going to the Lombardi Trophy," Porter said. "Now we can look at it as the Lombardi Trophy is on the same road back to the Superdome."

It came full circle as Porter came up with another one of those biggest plays in Saints history-type plays he seems to have a knack for making lately. He created the lone Super Bowl XLIV turnover on his 74-yard interception return for a touchdown late in the fourth quarter that sealed the historic victory.

As if possibly sending Vikings quarterback Brett Favre into retirement with the memory of Porter's interception with less than 20 seconds left in the NFC Championship Game wasn't enough, Porter knew he was in for another earth-shattering play when the Colts tipped their hand.

"As soon as I saw Austin Collie go in motion, I said, 'Oh yeah. This is the route they've been running all year,' " Porter said. "I had it in my mind that I was going to jump the route. He had a double move. I knew that [Darren] Sharper was on the back end. He's a ballhawking guy that was going to protect me over the top."

Porter made it look as if Manning were throwing the pass to Porter instead of Reggie Wayne. Porter said once he saw Will Smith make a block on Manning and Anthony Hargrove shield an oncoming Colts offensive tackle he saw "daylight."

"I knew it was game, set, match," Sharper said once he saw Porter take it to the house.

Porter grew up in Port Allen, La., which is about an hour up Interstate 10 from New Orleans. So he has been a Saints fan his entire life.

To make the biggest play of his life in the biggest game in Saints franchise history for the team he grew up wishing to play for wasn't lost on Porter after the game.

"What it meant: going up two scores knowing the type of defense we have and the type of clock-control offense that we have at times, it was real big," Porter said. "We know the people of New Orleans -- the people of Louisiana, period -- they're behind this team. When we're not doing well and down, it's almost like they're down. This team, I have to say, this team means more to the people of New Orleans than I can say any team in the NFL. No one is behind their team as much as the people of New Orleans."

It almost wasn't to be for Porter, though.

Porter feared the worst when a fellow defender rolled up his knee from behind in New Orleans' Week 9 victory in St. Louis. The fear was that he tore his ACL; he merely sprained his MCL. The Saints brought Porter back slowly because they realized his value when he and a healthy Jabari Greer roam the secondary.

The last thing defensive coordinator Gregg Williams wanted to see was an injury to stunt Porter's development, because Williams put in plenty of hours during the offseason building up Porter's confidence.

"The first thing that went through my mind [when Porter was running to the end zone] was 'finally.' I say 'finally' because when I first got in there [to New Orleans], everyone was high on him. But they said, 'Gregg, he takes things too seriously. Gregg, he has a hard time forgetting plays.' So I used the whole spring and the whole training camp, and he was my whipping dog.

Tracy Porter steps in front of Reggie Wayne and cements his place in Saints lore. (AP)

"It took a long time to stop sticking his lip out because I was on him so hard. Once he figured out that I was giving him a lot of attention because I liked him, he started giving me some of that swagger back. ... You can't be afraid of making a play. He pulled the trigger. He made the play."

It wasn't one of those "remember me" shots Williams preached to his defense to lay on Manning. This will be a "remember me" interception that Manning will never forget and Porter will eternally live out in his mind.

"This is a moment he can really use to build off of to where he can build his status as one of the top cornerbacks in the league," Sharper said. "I tell him all the time that he can be one of the top cornerbacks in the league because he has all the skills, all the intangibles, all the talents to do that. Plays like this in big-time games can catapult guys to the upper echelon."

The first thought in Greer's head when Porter intercepted Favre in the final seconds of regulation was one of envy.

"That lucky bastard," Greer said two weeks ago. "He's going to go down in history."

Porter's not only in the history books.

He'll be on the cover.