Super Bowl 2012 Highlights: Looking Back at Ahmad Bradshaw's Game-Winning TD

The New York Giants can laugh about it now that they're going to Disney World, but at the time, Ahmad Bradshaw's go-ahead touchdown looked like it might go down as one of the strangest goofs in Super Bowl history.

With just over a minute left and the Giants six yards away from taking the lead, the New England Patriots put on their best "Matador" defense, parting the seas for Bradshaw to barge into the end zone.

His football instincts in full gear, Bradshaw soon realized that he wasn't supposed to touch pay dirt just yet, that his job was to go down as close to the goal line as possible without going over. That would've allowed the G-Men to bleed the clock before putting the Pats away.

Instead, Bradshaw popped the most awkward squat ever shown on national television and fell backwards, helplessly, across the plane to give his team a 21-17 lead.

Never has a crucial score in the fourth quarter been greeted with such a sigh of disappointment. Rather than celebrating the biggest touchdown of his life, Bradshaw went back to the sideline to sweat out the final minute of the game, hoping and praying Big Blue's defense would keep Tom Brady from marching the Pats offense down the field and onto a decisive score to close out the game.

Bradshaw's embarrassment in that moment was surpassed only by Bill Belichick's coaching brilliance, giving up a lead to put the ball in the hands of one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time.

Of course, the ambivalence that befell Bradshaw quickly turned to team-wide jubilation once Brady's final Hail Mary fell harmlessly to the turf.

But in the heat of the moment, Bradshaw's stance at the 1-yard line was nothing short of fetal.

Luckily for the Giants, though, it didn't prove to be fatal.

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