By GREGG PATTON, The Press-Enterprise

Roger Clemens squirmed, blustered and got indignant. Brian McNamee perspired, grimaced and weathered accusations that he was a liar and a "drug dealer." Hopefully, somewhere, a high school athlete took it all in and decided steroids weren't worth the aggravation.

It was a monumental day for the New York Giants, a gritty, well-deserved victory in Super Bowl XLII. For the New England Patriots, it was a monumental crash, the loudest in NFL history. But in the big picture, it changed nothing about the landscape of the league. The Patriots remain the NFL's model of excellence, the envy of every organization.

PHOENIX -- Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have had more hits than Tom Brady took all season. Now that I've taken care of the obligatory football reference, I can move on to the real reason most of the Super Bowl journalists showed up Thursday: to check out the rockers who will be doing the halftime entertainment.

Random notes, idle thoughts and zinging the zing-fest around the sports world ...-- The storm of criticism that the Chargers All-Pro running back LaDainian Tomlinson has taken for his early departure from Sunday's AFC Championship Game isn't really about him.

For the San Diego Chargers, it's going to have to be a heck of an encore.

The question of the hour after San Diego won its first playoff game in 13 years Sunday was, "How does it feel to get that monkey off your back?"

SAN DIEGO -- Philip Rivers didn't take it personally.

PASADENA, Calif. -- USC wasn't running up the score so much as running down memory lane, and running through their playbook.

LOS ANGELES -- Mike D'Antoni wasn't feeling any better about this one, either. Maybe worse.

The New England Patriots steaming into the Super Bowl looks as inevitable as, well, the 2005 Indianapolis Colts steaming into the Super Bowl after their 13-0 start. Whoops.