This year’s Super Bowl matchup could be called Déjà Blue. It could be called the rematch for which the Patriots have been waiting.

Many call it the result of an injured team getting healthy and hot at the end of the regular season and riding its way through the postseason to meet a team that has played much more skillfully and successfully and truly deserves to be playing for the championship.

However it’s described, the Giants’ impressive post-season performance might have a couple of critics regretting their words earlier this year.

Last August, during an interview on ESPN New York 1050 radio station before the 2011 season began, Giants quarterback Eli Manning was asked if he considered himself in the same elite standing as the Patriots’ quarterback, Tom Brady.  Manning replied, “I consider myself in that class.” The aftermath from the critics was ugly – and aren’t New Yorkers the harshest critics?

I learned this the hard way. My dad is a New York City native, and he passed along his love of the Giants to me. One weekend while we were visiting my grandmother in Brooklyn, we tuned in for a particularly ugly Giants game with a less-than-elite performance by Eli.

They were playing at home against the Vikings and losing…badly. After the game, I was listening to the angry calls of New York fans stream in on WFAN, a New York sports talk radio station.

The callers did not seem disappointed, but actually angry with the outcome of the game, which my 15-year-old self deemed a less-than-appropriate response to one loss of the season.

Nonetheless, the callers were saying harsh things that suggested that the Giants find themselves a new quarterback and that they would never be successful with Manning leading them.

I was shocked at these comments for two completely different reasons. The first from the rational side of me that wished that these fans would not turn on their quarterback so easily, and second from the teenage girl side of me who was (and still is) head-over-heels in love with Manning.

Little did I know that while I was swooning over his good looks, Manning was going to teach me some valuable lessons in the seasons to come.

This is Manning’s eighth, and unquestionably best, year in the NFL. He threw for 29 touchdowns, just two fewer than his career high from last season. He reduced his interceptions from 25 to 16.

He also threw for a career- and franchise-record 4,933 yards. Keep in mind that the New York Giants have been around since 1925 and have had such terrific quarterbacks as Charlie Conerly, Y.A. Tittle, Fran Tarkenton and Phil Simms (my father’s favorite, though he says Manning is growing on him.)

Manning is not one to get flustered, and I feel as if I have personally watched his composure in the pocket develop over the years. In fact, while the heavens parted in praise for the Denver Broncos’ Tim Tebow’s ability to come from behind and win games, it is actually Manning whose fourth-quarter passer rating is 6.0 points higher than Tebow’s and 4.4 points higher than Aaron Rodgers’, the Packers quarterback whom the Giants defeated in the divisional playoff game this postseason. Only three other quarterbacks in the league rival Manning’s 20 fourth-quarter and overtime-winning drives.

So, while Tebow had both a more alluring story and victory pose, it is Manning’s quiet confidence that reigned supreme. Manning celebrates modestly, to say the least, always looking ahead to future games. It was a less-than-prodigal season for Manning and the Giants, and yet they are the ones who will play for the championship.  No “Tebowing” or “discount double checks” in sight.

Manning’s postseason performance has earned him the title of current NFL quarterback with the most road playoff wins. Because the Giants finished the regular season as a 9-7 team proves that the regular season is distinct from the playoffs. Aaron Rodgers’ and the Packers’ 15-1 season met their demise courtesy of a clutch Big Blue squad, just like four years ago led by you know who.

While I still have to wonder what the critics expected Manning to say during his radio interview last August, it is clear that there is no longer any question about his quarterback status. I am not surprised though, as I have been his biggest supporter since he first became a Giant.  After all, as we’ve all heard, you really can’t spell “elite” without “Eli.”