N.Y. Times Game Article

Jets Prove They Are a Hot Team, Even in Icy Green Bay

By KAREN CROUSE

Published: December 4, 2006

GREEN BAY, Wis., Dec. 3 ? It had grown as tedious as a fellow commuter?s cellphone conversation, all the talk about how the Jets would shrivel in the frigid conditions that awaited them here.

At first, B. J. Askew tried to freeze out the critics? voices, but Sunday, as he was dressing to go out on Lambeau Field for some light running two hours before the Jets? game against the Packers, he was struck by inspiration.

He put on his cutoff sweat pants and his shoes and stepped into the 15-degree morning shirtless, as if he were in South Beach and not in the upper Midwest.

?I wouldn?t want to be out there like that for hours,? Askew said, ?but just to send a message or whatever, it was great.?

The Packers fans who arrived early, bundled in parkas and knitted caps to ward off the cold, called Askew over to the yellow fence separating the field from the stands and asked who he was. They seemed impressed when they discovered Askew was the Jets? starting fullback.

?They told me, ?Hey you guys are going to be good,? ? Askew said. ?And I said, ?Yeah, we?re going to be all right.? ?

The Jets turned out to be much better than that in their 38-10 victory. They put together a first half that was so close to perfect, it would have made a Jets fan out of Vince Lombardi himself.

The tone set by Askew in the warm-ups carried over to the game, and the Jets played as if they were not cowed by either the cold winds of December or the mystique of Lambeau Field.

They scored on their first five possessions to take a 31-0 lead at halftime. Packers quarterback Brett Favre said he had never seen anything quite like that in his 16 seasons. ?That?s tough to swallow,? he said.

Jets quarterback Chad Pennington picked up where he left off a week earlier, when he threw for 286 yards in a 26-11 victory against the Houston Texans. He fired completions as if he were in a hypnotic state.

The game plan by the Jets? offensive coordinator, Brian Schottenheimer, had more teeth than a headwind. In defiance of the 18 mile-an-hour gusts, Pennington came out in the opening drive and completed passes to six receivers, then tried for 6 points instead of a first down on a third-and-1 at the Packers? 6.

His pass to wide receiver Jerricho Cotchery in the back of the end zone was caught by the wind. But the Jets came away with 3 points on a 24-yard field goal by Mike Nugent while making a bigger point.

?We knew we had the field goal,? Pennington said, ?and it was just part of Brian?s philosophy of staying aggressive and not letting the elements or anything like that affect what we do.?

In the first half, Pennington passed for 241 yards and had touchdown throws to Cotchery and to tight end Chris Baker.

?We looked like we had no pass rush,? Packers Coach Mike McCarthy said. ?We looked like we were playing in mud. Chad Pennington was just out there playing pitch and catch with his receivers.?

McCarthy, in his first season as the Packers? coach, is a close friend of Schottenheimer, and he thinks so much of him professionally that earlier this year he wanted to interview him to be his quarterbacks coach.

But Schottenheimer, who held the same position in San Diego at the time, was not given permission to talk to Green Bay. He was disappointed, but soon after, Eric Mangini, the Jets? new coach, approached him about a coordinator job.

Schottenheimer had never called plays before this year, but on Sunday he looked as if he had been doing it for years.

?He had the right game plan for us, and we went out and executed it to perfection,? Baker said.

Under Mangini, the Jets (7-5) are Team Chameleon, changing looks from week to week to afford themselves the best chance of survival. Strategies mutate, formations shift, inactive players turn into starters and vice versa.

Against the Packers (4-8), the star running back was Cedric Houston, who did not even suit up three weeks ago against New England. Since then, he has gone from inactive to incandescent, and he burned the Packers for 105 yards and 2 touchdowns on 22 carries.

The best player on defense was linebacker Bryan Thomas, who used to play defensive end. He had one and a half sacks to improve his season total to a career-high six and a half.

Thomas?s sack of Favre in the first quarter set up the Jets? first touchdown, a 12-yard catch by Cotchery that capped a 7-play, 51-yard drive. Cotchery, who was able to find plenty of open space because the Packers were sending a safety to double Laveranues Coles, finished with nine catches for 99 yards.

Favre, who passed for 214 yards, was intercepted twice, by cornerback Andre Dyson in the second quarter and by safety Kerry Rhodes in the fourth.

Pennington was intercepted twice in the third, which made for a very long quarter for the Jets? defense, which was on the field for all but five snaps. The second pick of Pennington, by Patrick Dendy, led to the Packers? touchdown, a four-play, 37-yard drive that ended with a 20-yard reception by Donald Driver.

?The momentum could have shifted in the third quarter,? Mangini said. ?But I thought that there wasn?t any real sense of panic by anybody.

?We just went out there and dealt with the situations as they came up. There was a sense of calmness throughout the defense during that period.?

The good vibrations started two hours before kickoff, with Askew baring his chest, a move that inspired some of his teammates and perplexed others. ?I thought he was an idiot,? Pennington said, laughing.

On this day there was glee all around. The tingling that the Jets felt was a result of something other than the cold. It came from their warming to their potential.

EXTRA POINTS

Jets defensive end Shaun Ellis was injured in the third quarter when his legs were cut from under him on a block by running back Vernand Morency. Ellis left the field but was able to return; he and Morency spent the rest of the game jawing at each other. They were still exchanging unpleasantries as they walked off the field toward their respective locker rooms. Ellis took a step toward Morency at one point and had to be restrained by his teammate Na?Shan Goddard. ?I got upset about it,? Ellis said, adding: ?When you get cut from behind, it?s very frustrating. I was bothered, but there?s nothing you can do about it.?