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Pennington gets his revenge, Dolphins win division

Dec 29, 2008 - 3:53 AM By Joe Rizzo PA SportsTicker Corresponding Writer

EAST RUTHERFORD, New Jersey (Ticker) -- Turns out the Brett Favre experiment paid off - for Chad Pennington and the Miami Dolphins.

Released from the New York Jets when they acquired Favre in training camp, Pennington came back Giants Stadium to lead the rival Dolphins to an improbable AFC East division title with a 24-17 win over New York on Sunday.

Third-seeded Miami (11-5) will host the Baltimore Ravens (11-5) next week in the first round of the playoffs, the Dolphins' first postseason appearance in seven seasons.

Miami closed the regular season with a five-game winning streak as part of a 9-1 run to win its first division title since 2000.

"This is unbelievable, to win our division and be in the playoffs," Dolphins owner Wayne Huizenga said. "I'm happy for everybody in South Florida and for Dolphin fans everywhere."

Favre and the Jets (9-7) missed the playoffs after losing four of their last five games. In an inevitable comparison, Favre led New York to three more wins than his replacement with the Green Bay Packers, Aaron Rodgers.

After the game, Favre did not make any announcements regarding his future. He is getting an MRI exam on his shoulder on Monday.

"It hurts in the back," Favre said. "It hurts down the biceps, occasionally, my neck. Other than that, it's fine. The obvious (retirement) choice would be a quick decision based on what happened. It's a hasty, irrational decision based on what happened. I'll go home and get away for a week or so, and make the right decision.

"The hardest part is the finality of it, especially when you expect to go on. It was a tough pill to swallow. But I had a blast working with these guys. It's disappointing where we are now, but I wouldn't trade it for anything."

Pennington completed 22-of-30 passes for 200 yards and two touchdowns for the Dolphins, who amazingly rebounded from a 1-15 record last season with the main additions of coach Tony Sparano, Pennington and left tackle Jake Long, the No. 1 overall draft choice.

"It's always a sweet feeling to be a champion," Pennington said. "My teammates and coaches accepted me from the get-go and it's just been an unbelievable ride. We're really enjoying ourselves right now.

"It's not a revenge factor. It was strictly focusing on winning a championship. It just so happened that it had to come through New York. That's the only way fate would have it, that I had to come back to New York to try and win a championship. I just had a funny feeling that it would. It shouldn't and couldn't be any other way."

Another new face, rookie defensive end Phillip Merling, returned one of Favre's three interceptions 25 yards to give the Dolphins a 14-6 lead with 2:03 left in the first half.

It came just 15 seconds after Pennington hit Ted Ginn with a 27-yard scoring strike to get the Dolphins on the board.

Ginn, running backs Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams and cornerback Andre' Goodman are among the holdovers from last season's team. Ginn had 71 yards on two catches, Brown and Williams combined for 125 offensive yards and Goodman had a pair of interceptions.

"It's really something you can't describe," said Ginn, who listened to critics rip the Dolphins' selection of him over quarterback Brady Quinn in the 2007 first round. "Chad came in like he always comes in: ready, focused, wanting to make everything perfect. Believe it or not, it's a better situation for him. He came here, he took over and we got behind him as a team."

"To go through what we went through last year, you could imagine what we felt like," said Goodman, who is a third-year Dolphin after playing four seasons with the Detroit Lions. "To go from that to this, you're overcome with emotion."

The Jets watched during this game as Baltimore pulled away from Jacksonville to extinguish New York's remaining hope to make the playoffs.

New York squandered its chance to win the division by sputtering down the stretch and officially was eliminated from AFC East contention when the Patriots finished a 13-0 win at Buffalo in an earlier game.

"Yeah, I do (think I am coming back next season)," Jets coach Eric Mangini said. "We have never discussed it throughout the course of the season, but that's my anticipation."

Despite what was fast becoming a meaningless contest to them, the Jets rallied to take a 17-14 lead with 10:35 left in the third quarter when Leon Washington ran 10 yards for a score and Favre hit Jerricho Cotchery for the two-point conversion.

But Pennington responded to lead Miami on a six-play, 80-yard drive that he capped with a perfect touch pass from the 20-yard line to the right side of the end zone, where tight end Anthony Fasano hauled it in to make it 21-17.

Linebacker Charlie Anderson blocked a punt in the fourth quarter to give Miami the ball a yard inside Jets territory, and Dan Carpenter capitalized with a 48-yard field goal that stretched the lead to 24-17 with 9:20 left.

An animated Sparano gave an approving fist-pump on the sidelines. Sparano had a lot to be excited about, as his team matched the 1999 Indianapolis Colts' NFL single-season improvement record of 10 wins.

The Dolphins' win also knocked the defending conference champion Patriots from the playoffs, a year after they completed a 16-0 regular season.

"This is tremendously emotional," Sparano said. "I couldn't be prouder for any of my players in the locker room, but certainly for the guys that were here last year."

Goodman intercepted Favre for the second time in the game to foil a potential Jets' threat as the veteran attempted to catch the scrambling Miami defense sleeping after hitting Laveranues Coles with a 21-yard pass.

Miami took over at its own 28 and was able to run the clock to 17 seconds, with Pennington's two-yard sneak on 4th-and-1 bringing the ball to the Jets' 38 to extend the drive at the two-minute warning.

"I wanted that," Pennington said. "I felt like they'd be looking for a different play."

Favre was 20-of-40 for 233 yards and a score. Acquired out of retirement after the start of training camp, he was at times spectacular for the Jets this season but ultimately drew consistent boos from the crowd at Giants Stadium.

The disgruntled fans were loudest when Favre intended a pass to the right side for Thomas Jones but instead threw a soft toss to Merling that the 6-4, 290-pounder grabbed and took to the end zone.

On his way, Merling switched the ball to his left hand to avoid getting stripped by Favre, who appeared to injure himself with a forearm-to-forearm chop with his throwing arm in an attempt to strip the rookie.

The Jets opened the scoring with 6:47 left in the first half when Favre hit Coles on a crossing route for a 13-yard score. The extra-point attempt was aborted as punter Reggie Hodges could not put down the snap, leaving it 6-0.

"To be in the position we were in and then all of a sudden just have a meltdown over the last five or six weeks," Jets right tackle Damien Woody said, "it's really hard to swallow right now."