Can a Good defense really carry a team to the Superbowl?

Question

Yes, I am a Bears fan and I know my defense carried my team like 5 games ( Arizona was the most telling, forcing 2 fumbles and returning them for td's and Hester returned for the winning score, while our struggling QB threw 4 picks and fumbled twice and Leinart looked like Manning out there), but then how do you lose the Superbowl and the defense does terrible if thats what got you there.

Also, the Colts left with 3 or 7 on every drive in the Game

Answer 1

Absolutely, Look at the Patriots.

Answer 2

Yes It Can But You Cant Rely On Your Defense To Pick Up The Slack
Ravens And Bucs Quarterbacks Weren't As Bad As Rex

SuperBowl 35 Ravens win 38-7

Superbowl 37 Bucs Win 48-21

At Least These Teams Can Score Points

Answer 3

All though I don't like to admit it, the Colts weathered the top ranked defense, the Baltimore Ravens in the post season last year. The Colts out-coached and out executed the Ravens at the punch even without an offensive TD. The Ravens have also seen Manning all most every season since he joined the Colts, they are one of the very few defenses that know how to confuse him by disquising their blitz packages and formations very well. One of the things the Ravens do best on defense.

The Bears on the other hand see the Colts in regular season once every 4 seasons. Obviously that's not a recipe for success against one of the most talented QBs in the league.

The Bears couldn't do that, they couldn't stop the Colts defense from demonstrating "clutch" defense in the post-season, despite the fact that they where horrible against the run in the regular season.

However to answer your question, the 2000 Ravens are the only team I can really think of that had a defense that carried the team. There was a stretch of 5 games where the Ravens went without scoring an offensive TD, and because of the defense they still won a couple of those games (also thanks in LARGE part to kicker Matt Stover).

The offense was a patch-work, play it safe mode that relied heavily on the running game of Preist Holmes and Jamal Lewis. TE Shannon Sharpe also had a huge hand championship season on his part. However after the Ravens 5 game struggle on offense, starting QB Tony Banks lost his job to back-up Trent Dilfer (who held up his responsibilty once he got the nod as the starter).

Basically you could plan to set up the run against the Ravens D, but ummm...no it just wasn't going to work. You might get some yards, but it's going to hurt. Tony Siragusa, Sam Adams, would open up holes in the o-line, and say hello to Ray Lewis. Secondary had McCallister, linebackers also had Peter Boulware who might be a hall of famer in his own right, and generally the defense was a cohesive unit that wanted to a DID dominate you as an offense.

They dared you to run, and waited for that 3rd down opportuntiny when you had to play into their hand of a 3rd and long passing down, not far from where you started on the first down. The Ravens might have given up some yards, but they had the "bend but not break" aura about them all most all season long.

But you are highly unlikely to see a defense anywhere near that dominant take a team to a superbowl championship the way the 2000 Ravens did. On paper the other top defenses like the 85 Bears, the Steelers in the 70s had more established to work with (not to take anything away from their accomplishments).

Answer 4

Ask the Bucs Defense that dominated the high powered Offense of the Raiders a few years ago. If the Raiders had Manning, I think they would have won that game. The Bucs had an adequate QB, but far from a great one. He was consistent.
As far of the Bears losing the super bowl, you have to remember that they were playing against, arguably, the best offense in the NFL. Manning took a little while to figure out the defense of the Bears. He's the master of reading a defense and anticipating what they are going to do. Grossman was not consistent. All he had to do was protect the ball to win games and he didn't do too well at that.

Answer 5

Defense does win championships but after that many games (regular season, and playoffs combined) of your defense carrying the entire team, they were just tired. They were tired, beat up, and hurting. And against an offense as lethal as Indy's they were bound to finally fall. The other thing is, playing in the NFL North division makes your defense look much better than it may be. I'm not saying that the Bear's defense isn't a phenomenal freak of nature, I'm just saying that they may not have been conditioned to handle the kind of attack that Indianapolis threw at them.

Above all else - Indy had the right approach. They pounded the ball up the middle. The cover 2 zone defense is a great defense but it has one glaring fault. If you run directly at it and pound the ball up the gut of the defense you can destroy your opponants. The cover 2 is designed to put constant pressure on the QB by using smaller, quicker D-linemen and faster cover type linebackers. The cover 2 style defense and especially the Bears' defense cannot defend against a team who is hammering the ball up the middle and when Indy came in and started power running up the middle, the whole defensive scheme came crashing to the ground. When the defense tried to regroup and change up the defensive scheme to stop the run, it opened up the passing game and that's when the game really got out of hand.

It's not that the Bears' defense was terrible, it was just not prepared to defend against the offensive scheme that the Colts brought to the table. They expected Indy to use their patented hurry-up no huddle offense that focuses on an arial attack. Had Indy come into the game with the air-attack mindset, we may have seen a different ballgame. Indy was smart enough to design a gameplan that focused on running the ball and it worked brilliantly.

And when your offense plays as poorly as Chicago's did, no amount of defense will save you.

Answer 6

Absolutely--there are a few teams that come to mind--the 2000 Ravens which had Trent Dilfer at QB and a stellar D led by Ray Lewis. The 2002 Bucs had Brad Johnson as their QB and were pretty much carried by the D. And the 1975 Steelers--their first SB winner--may have been the best defensive unit of all time. And their offense in those days wasn't that good--Bradshaw was very erratic until the late 70s when their last two SB winning teams were very good offensively.

Answer 7

The defence didn´t suck it up the Colts had the ball at the 50 every drive cause of all the turn overs the Bears had. And yes the Defence can take you all the way look at the Ravens a few years back for god sake Trent Dilfer was their QB and the Bears in ´85 their D carried them and Walter Payton the formula for success is good D and Running Game then build around that and GO BEARS

Answer 8

The Ravens have a Superbowl win with Trent Dilfer as the QB, that pretty much sums it up. As to how they lost the Superbowl, simple there were gaps to that D. The other teams just weren't quite able to take advantage of them. Like you said look at the Cardinals. They saw the gaps and took advantage of them for awhile. I think the problem/difference with the Colts is the Bears COULDN'T close the gaps. Between how good the Colts are at exposing them and that the Bears got away with it too long and that was how they played.

Answer 9

Yes, good defenses can carry a team to the Superbowl, but having a solid offense helps as well.

The Colts defense was solified in the playoffs with return of Bob Sanders. Peyton Manning struggled in the post-season, and if it wasn't for the Colts defense, I don't think they would have even made it to the Superbowl.

After a shaky start, the Colt's offense did settle in, and that's what helped them win against the Patriots.

Having a good defense is necessary, but so is having a good offense. It's 50/50 if you ask me.

Answer 10

it certainly did for the Indianapolis Colts this year. the defense was spectacular, remeber Peyton did not carry this team at all during the playoffs.

Game 1: colts only gave up 44 rushing yards and 126 total yards, 5 sacks, 2 INTs, 1 fumble rec

game 2: 83 rushing yards given up 160 passing, 2 Ints, 2fumble rec

game 3 against NE, was an equal play from both indys offense and defense but a late INT sealed the game

super bowl: Colts forced 5 turnovers

so yeah Defense carried both teams to the Super Bowl and it gave INDY there first win

Answer 11

No....The Carolina Panthers have had a great defense since their Super Bowl run but their offense, even with Steve Smith, has been at the middle or near the bottom of the league. Oakland last year had a top 10 defense, but their offense was the worst in the NFL. So just because you have a great defense doesn't mean instant Super Bowl. And great defenses does not a team make, you need offense to help out the defense too.