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SUPER BOWL XXIII

I always paid attention to what I ate before games. Your stomach has to be not empty but not full. I'd have a little piece of steak before games, maybe some coffee, a Snickers bar at halftime, then I'd have one of the guys on the team put a cheeseburger in my locker for after the game. Against Cincinnati, I got to the stadium so early that I was hungry, so I ate my Snickers bar before the game started. And in the fourth quarter, on the drive to beat them late in the game, I almost passed out. You couldn't even talk in the huddle. It was so loud. I was hyperventilating, yelling at the top of my lungs, and I was running out of juice. Halfway through the drive, I thought I was going to black out. I was seeing black and white fuzziness. I put my hands under center, and it felt like I was there for seconds. But I wasn't. Jerry [Rice] was running to a corner to the left, and I threw the ball 10 yards out of bounds because I thought I was going to pass out. I was using every bit of oxygen I had. Then, by the next play, it went away. I didn't say anything. I didn't even think about it again. And it came down to a touchdown pass to win the game. I did that 1,000 times in the backyard, throwing to my friends. To have that come into play and be a reality, that dream come true, that drive, I was extremely excited. There's nothing like that feeling, coming from behind, to throw a touchdown pass and have it be in the Super Bowl. And when I got back to the locker room, a cheeseburger was in my locker. Usually I have to fight some of the linemen for it, but this time I didn't.
-- As told to Seth Wickersham of ESPN The Magazine