It can't have happened before. Two brothers, both head coaches of NFL teams, both playing in their respective Conference Finals with a trip to the Superbowl on the line both manage to lose the game on last minute field goals on the same day? Impossible.
And yet, Head Coaches Jim Harbaugh of the San Francisco '49ers and John Harbaugh of the Baltimore Ravens managed to do just that.
There were differences, of course. The '49ers lost to the New York Giants in overtime when the Giants kiced a game winning field goal. The ravens lost when their field goal kicker blew a relatively easy (for a pro NFL kicker, not a schlub like me) 32 yard field goal that would have sent their game against the Patriots to overtime.
It had to be a pretty crushing day for Jack Harbaugh, watching both of his sons bow out of the playoffs within hours of each other. It wasn't a picnic for me, either, since I'd been rooting for a Harbaugh vs Harbaugh rematch in the Superbowl. (John and the Ravens prevailed when the brothers' teams played against each other during the regular season.)
Still, at least both games were exciting, coming down to final kicks to resolve the game. You rarely get those kind of close games in the playoffs, and almost never on the same day, so there was that. And we'll get to see a different rematch, a re-do of Superbowl XLII with the Giants vs the Patriots.
Of course to get there, we'll have to watch the agonizing spectacle of sports journalism running out of material three days into the two week gap between the Conference Finals and the Superbowl, and then hearing variations of the same stories for the rest of the fortnight.
It's just too bad we don't get Harbaugh vs Harbaugh. That alone might have kept the sports guys busy an extra day or two.
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