Loomis said he tries not to spend much time reflecting on that achievement.<\/p>\n
“I’m always looking forward, not behind but when you have the event here, and you see what it’s become \u2013 because as fantastic as it was then and as big as it was then, it’s gotten bigger every year.<\/p>\n
“And obviously New Orleans is the best city to have the event, but it just makes you want to, ‘We’ve got to get back to this.’ When you’re a team playing in the game, none of this stuff, you don’t experience it, you don’t really feel it. You’re just focused on the playing and winning the game.<\/p>\n
“So you don’t get to enjoy all these other things that are happening around you. But I’d like to be in that position again.”<\/p>\n
Once the Saints reached the Super Bowl in 2010, there were different emotions.<\/p>\n
Charleston was sure of victory and as a former Colt, he had motivation.<\/p>\n
“I was on the Colts in ’07, and all I could think all week was we cannot lose, because I cannot see another Peyton Manning commercial,” he said. “To lose that game, and then to see \u2013 he was already on a lot of them. So (Saints quarterback and Super Bowl MVP) Drew (Brees) then got all of those commercials after that.<\/p>\n
“That was something that, playing an old team \u2013 there was a couple of us that had played for the Colts and we were facing our former team \u2013 and we knew we had a shot. If we don’t get the onside kick, if we don’t get the two-point conversion \u2013 there’s a lot of things that could have happened in that game, it could have went a different way. But we won. I can tell you that the parade on that Wednesday was just as good as the game.”<\/p>\n
Daniel said there was anxiousness simply to play the game.<\/p>\n
“I was the third-string quarterback, so I wasn’t nervous at all,” he said. “And I remember Drew and Mark Brunell in the room just like, ‘Let’s just go out there and have fun.’ Because you wait so long to play the game after the NFC championship game \u2013 it’s two weeks \u2013 you don’t realize the break between it. That two weeks seemed like a month-and-a-half and by the time you were at the game, you were just so ready to play the game.<\/p>\n
“It was a blast because we didn’t start very well, but we finished really well. And Tracy (Porter’s) pick-6, that’s just like the play of the history of the Saints. One of those things where you’ll never forget the feeling on the sideline.”<\/p>\n
Loomis was nervous due to the opponent.<\/p>\n
“Because we’re playing against (quarterback) Peyton Manning \u2013 they were the favorite,” Loomis said. “We were the Little Engine That Could. So, that’s nerve-wracking.<\/p>\n
“You’re playing against one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time \u2013 and we love Drew, he is a great quarterback, one of the best of all time \u2013 but we were the underdog. But I think that was a good position for us to be in.”<\/p>\n
It turned out to be the best position for New Orleans, as the team solidified the “Walk Together Forever” theme that had been preached by assistant head coach\/linebackers coach Joe Vitt.<\/p>\n
“That was something that he said all year, talking about the team picture and how it doesn’t mean anything if you don’t win it,” Charleston said. “Special group of guys, I still talk to quite a few of them. There’s 10 of us on a group chat, we still talk all the time.<\/p>\n
“Special group. Even if the Saints go on and go on a dynasty run, it still will always be the first one for New Orleans. As long as we’re alive, people won’t forget that.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Loomis said he tries not to spend much time reflecting on that achievement. “I’m always looking forward, not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2059],"tags":[39376,2005,7,2004,392,2381,81,3051,6,10302],"class_list":{"0":"post-179399","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-indianapolis-colts","8":"tag-2009-super-bowl","9":"tag-colts","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-indianapolis","12":"tag-indianapolis-colts","13":"tag-indianapoliscolts","14":"tag-latest-news","15":"tag-news-john-deshazier","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-super-bowl-lix"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114791846123467893","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}