SEE ALSO: 10 Most Watched YouTube Videos Of 2011

The Super Bowl will be streamed online and to phones in the U.S. for the first time, the NFL said Tuesday. NBC’s broadcasts of wild card Saturday, the Pro Bowl and the Super Bowl will be available on the league’s and network’s websites and through Verizon’s NFL Mobile app.

The service will include additional camera angles, in-game highlights and live stats – and replays of those always popular Super Bowl ads.

NBC has been streaming its “Sunday Night Football” telecasts for four seasons, and what the network has found is it’s not just being used by fans who can’t get in front of a set. Many of the page views come from people using the service as a complement to watching the game on TV.

That certainly would seem likely for the Super Bowl on Feb. 5 from Indianapolis. The game is annually by far the biggest attraction on television, with last season’s Packers-Steelers matchup drawing a record U.S. audience for any show with 111 million viewers.

“Whether it’s just for a quarter if somebody has to run out to the store to get something they forgot, now they can stay connected to the game,” Hans Schroeder, the NFL’s senior vice president of media strategy and development, told The Associated Press. “With such a big television audience, it will be interesting to see the expanded reach.”

NBC’s streams on Sunday nights typically average 200,000-300,000 viewers, compared with 21 million for the telecasts. The network has seen no evidence it hurts the traditional broadcasts’ healthy TV ratings. If anything, the extra options online may help keep fans glued to the games on their sets.

“We don’t want to limit ourselves to people not in front of the TV,” said Rick Cordella, vice president and general manager for NBC Sports Digital Media.

“The playoffs are appointment viewing,” he added. “People schedule their day around it.”

The NFL and NBC will do extensive research to find out exactly how many people are watching the streams and how they’re using them. What number of fans want to watch the Super Bowl each year but aren’t in front of a TV for whatever reason?

Schroeder wonders had this been around for the Super Bowl three years ago, if fans at parties would have used the service to watch Santonio Holmes’ toe-scraping winning touchdown catch for the Pittsburgh Steelers over and over again.

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World Vision has similar deals with Major League Baseball, the NBA and the NHL, but football is the biggest generator of shirts.

Next month, a group of pro football players, including Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson and Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, will fly to Uganda to hand out shirts.

Read more at AOLnews.com

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Dallas –At this year’s Super Bowl, Hip-Hop was the star of the show in more ways than one. Not only did the Black Eyed Peas perform as the main act of the show, but the fight song of the Pittsburgh Steelers was made by upstart rapper, Wiz Khalifa.

The song, ‘Black and Yellow,’ has gone double platinum to date and is now the official anthem of the Pittsburgh Steelers. The song even inspired a retort by rap’s self-proclaimed king, Lil Wayne, who’s a Green Bay fan and dropped the song “Green and Yellow.”

Read more at NYTimes

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Halftime gig dream come true for BEP

Wisconsin — Aaron Rodgers at long last casts his own shadow. All it took was a Super Bowl victory for the Green Bay Packers.Capping one of the greatest postseasons for any quarterback, Rodgers led the Pack to their first NFL championship in 14 years Sunday, 31-25 over the Pittsburgh Steelers. They reclaimed the Vince Lombardi Trophy, named for their legendary coach who won the first two Super Bowls and is making his own star turn in New York in the play named after him.

Rodgers, the game’s MVP, thrilled his legion of Cheesehead fans with a spectacular six-game string that should finally erase the bitterness of the Brett Favre separation in Green Bay.

After sitting for three long years before Favre left in 2008, Rodgers is now equal with Favre in Super Bowl wins, and he extended the Packers’ record of NFL titles to 13, nine before the Super Bowl era.

“You can stop it now,” veteran receiver Donald Driver said. “Aaron’s proved that he’s one of the best, if not the best, quarterback in this game today.”

Read more at ESPN

About 1,250 fans were displaced because their seats were deemed unsafe – 400 who were sent home, and 850 who were given somewhere else to sit.

“The safety of fans attending the Super Bowl was paramount in making the decision and the NFL, Dallas Cowboys and City of Arlington officials are in agreement with the resolution,” the NFL said in a statement. “We regret the situation and inconvenience that it may have caused. We will conduct a full review of this matter.”

The NFL said the people relocated were put in “similar or better seats.”

Those turned away will be given a refund of triple the face value – however, $2,700 for $900 tickets may not be enough for folks who paid much more to scalpers, not to mention travel and hotel costs.

Seating woes are the latest frustration for the first Super Bowl at Jerry Jones’ $1.2 billion showplace.

A rare, severe winter storm moved into the area Tuesday, ripping holes in tents on the property and hampering travel and celebrations across the region. On Friday, six people at the stadium were injured by melting snow falling from the roof.

Organizers were hoping flawless game-day logistics would wipe out some of the complaints, but this seating problem could be an issue in the area’s plans to bid for the 50th Super Bowl in 2016.

The affected areas were four entryways and two portions of the upper deck on the west end. All were above empty spaces, so the stability of those structures apparently was the issue.

In the upper deck, there were off-limits seats in the same rows as seats that were deemed safe. Yellow police tape was used as a dividing line, with uniformed personnel also keeping folks away.

About 15,000 temporary seats were added to the stadium in a bid to set the record for the largest crowd in Super Bowl history. Jones was aiming for more than 105,000, including stadium workers and media, and fans who bought standing room tickets for plazas outside the stadium.

The temporary seats filled open platforms that are usually standing-room only “party pass” areas for Cowboys games. The entryways were on the third level, while the upper deck is on the fifth level.

ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that the Wynns are considering giving the baby the middle name “Super.”

Read more at the WashingtonPost.com

CALIFORNIA — Through his organization, The Love Jones 4 Kids Foundation, Green Bay Packer’s James Jones provides support for children in his hometown of San Jose, California. The organization partners with other nonprofits to support education, housing and other programs for poor and homeless youth.

Green Bay Packers wide receiver James Jones recently opened up about growing up homeless and how his past informs his generous spirit today.

Jones told reporters Wednesday he was “homeless from coming out of the hospital until I was a freshman in high school.” Now, the NFL star is enjoying a successful career with the Super Bowl-bound Packers, but he hasn’t forgotten the struggles of his early life — and he’s doing what he can to help children in need.

Jones was eventually able to move in with his grandmother during high school. His athletic performance in basketball and football attracted a scholarship to San Jose University and he was later drafted by the NFL.

Read more at HuffingtonPost.com

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Good News

The band said they are excited and honored to give the halftime performance during Sunday’s game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers

“We want everybody to have a good time and just dance, party,” will.i.am said about the performance that’s expected to include R&B star Usher and former Guns `N Roses guitarist Slash.

A person familiar with the plans for Sunday’s halftime show told The Associated Press that both musicians were slated to make surprise appearances. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity Wednesday, because the musicians’ performances were not going to be announced.

“Hopefully we will bring the heat because it’s cold as hell here in Dallas,” said Black Eyed Peas band member Taboo.

The band spoke at a news conference in downtown Dallas on the third consecutive day of subfreezing temperatures during a rare cold spell that greeted the first Super Bowl week in North Texas.

Taboo said the opportunity to provide entertainment for the NFL’s ultimate game is “a dream come true for us as football lovers.”

Fellow band member, Fergie, said it was a “huge honor” to be picked as halftime performer.

“Sunday football is a serious day in our homes,” said Fergie, who is a minority owner of the Miami Dolphins. “Super Bowl Sunday is the day that I can go all out – cheat – eat the seven-layer dip, all the Italian food and scream at everybody.”

The six-time Grammy award-winning Black Eyed Peas have sold more than 28 million albums worldwide and are known for songs such as “Boom Boom Pow,” “I Gotta Feeling” and “Imma Be.”

“Some people write songs for radio. Some people write songs for clubs. We like to write songs for life,” will.i.am said, adding that he is proud that many of their energetic songs are featured at sporting events.

At the news conference, band member apl.de.ap showed off his nod to his band playing at the Super Bowl: He had the band’s initials – BEP – and XLV – for the 45th Super Bowl – shaved into the back of his head.

The band also will bring some technology to the show as will.i.am will be tweeting during the performance.

Keith Urban and Maroon 5 will be performing during the pre-game festivities on Sunday. Christina Aguilera is set to sing the national anthem and Lea Michele of “Glee” will sing “America the Beautiful.”

Cities that host the big game often attract a bustling sex trade. This year, Texas authorities and advocacy groups are stepping up their anti-prostitution efforts, especially where young girls are concerned.

“Most people don’t know that our children are being brutalized this way, and we have to stop it,” said Deena Graves, founder of Traffick911, a Texas organization that launched the “I’m Not Buying It” campaign for Super Bowl XLV. “We need to get mad. We need to get angry about what’s happening to our kids right here.”

For weeks, volunteers have been canvassing neighborhoods in Dallas and other cities, distributing door hangars and posters with information. Others have placed coasters in restaurants and bars. Traffick911 has also made public-service announcements, some featuring current and former NFL players.

“As a man and as a father of two beautiful girls, I’m not buying it – and neither should you,” Dallas Cowboys nose tackle Jay Ratliff says in one television ad. “If you’re one of these men buying these young girls, I’m telling you that real men don’t buy children. They don’t buy sex.”

Pimps hawking young girls see the thousands of men who travel to the Super Bowl each year as a gold mine of potential clients. Police in and around host cities have tried for years to crack down on prostitution by conducting stings or increasing patrols during Super Bowl week. Only in recent years have underage girls come to light in increasing numbers.

“This is a very large issue. We want people to know what human trafficking looks like,” said Thomas Lawrence, an assistant Dallas police chief. Last year’s Super Bowl in Miami drew as many as 10,000 prostitutes, including children and human trafficking victims, police said.

Before the big game in 2008, Phoenix police broke up a child prostitution ring involving several teenagers. The following year in Tampa, two men were arrested for advertising the services of a 14-year-old as a “Super Bowl special.” They were sentenced to federal prison.

Last year, a Hawaii man was sentenced to more than 20 years in federal prison for taking a teenager with him to Miami and forcing her to work as a prostitute.

Police Cracking Down On Pimps, Prostitution At Super Bowl XLV
Super Bowl Sex Trafficking

ANGELA K. BROWN 02/ 1/11 06:51 AM AP
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ARLINGTON, Texas — As thousands of football fans descend on Texas for Sunday’s Super Bowl, law enforcement agencies are keeping watch for a different kind of out-of-town visitor: pimps selling children for sex.

Cities that host the big game often attract a bustling sex trade. This year, Texas authorities and advocacy groups are stepping up their anti-prostitution efforts, especially where young girls are concerned.

“Most people don’t know that our children are being brutalized this way, and we have to stop it,” said Deena Graves, founder of Traffick911, a Texas organization that launched the “I’m Not Buying It” campaign for Super Bowl XLV. “We need to get mad. We need to get angry about what’s happening to our kids right here.”

For weeks, volunteers have been canvassing neighborhoods in Dallas and other cities, distributing door hangars and posters with information. Others have placed coasters in restaurants and bars. Traffick911 has also made public-service announcements, some featuring current and former NFL players.

“As a man and as a father of two beautiful girls, I’m not buying it – and neither should you,” Dallas Cowboys nose tackle Jay Ratliff says in one television ad. “If you’re one of these men buying these young girls, I’m telling you that real men don’t buy children. They don’t buy sex.”

Pimps hawking young girls see the thousands of men who travel to the Super Bowl each year as a gold mine of potential clients. Police in and around host cities have tried for years to crack down on prostitution by conducting stings or increasing patrols during Super Bowl week. Only in recent years have underage girls come to light in increasing numbers.

“This is a very large issue. We want people to know what human trafficking looks like,” said Thomas Lawrence, an assistant Dallas police chief. Last year’s Super Bowl in Miami drew as many as 10,000 prostitutes, including children and human trafficking victims, police said.

Before the big game in 2008, Phoenix police broke up a child prostitution ring involving several teenagers. The following year in Tampa, two men were arrested for advertising the services of a 14-year-old as a “Super Bowl special.” They were sentenced to federal prison.

Last year, a Hawaii man was sentenced to more than 20 years in federal prison for taking a teenager with him to Miami and forcing her to work as a prostitute.
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To deter men from the temptations of readily available prostitutes, Arlington police have put up an electronic billboard near Cowboys Stadium featuring four men’s mug shots with the message, “Dear John, You Never Know! This could be you.”

Tekla Roberts, who was a prostitute for nearly 10 years after starting as a teenager, said she raked in the most cash during major golf tournaments, NASCAR races and some pro playoff games in North Texas. She said she met “johns” after advertising her services in publications and online and hanging out in hotels near the venues.

During those sporting events, she remembers seeing an influx of underage girls from out of town being sold for sex by their pimps.

“I would have so many more customers, but I would see pimps with their young girls, too,” said Roberts, 32, who gave up the sex trade about six years ago. “My self-esteem was so low, and I remember telling myself it was temporary . and then I would make so much money around these events.”

Advocacy groups and the North Texas Trafficking Task Force are focused on underage victims coming to Dallas ahead of Sunday’s game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers. They say pimps who engage in human trafficking place ads for escorts with out-of-town contact numbers and rent houses or buses for parties featuring underage girls.

Advocates say many Americans do not realize child sex trafficking happens in the United States, not just overseas. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children estimates that at least 100,000 children in the U.S. are victims of prostitution each year.

For years, some Texas cities have been trying to stop the cycle of runaways who become child prostitutes. Dallas police have taken a new approach by treating them as victims. Many are too afraid to seek help or too brainwashed to turn in their pimps.

“We’ve had to change the way we talk to kids,” said Sgt. Byron Fassett, who leads the Dallas department’s high-risk victims unit. “Just because a child has made some bad decisions doesn’t mean someone has the right to take advantage of that.”

Roberts, the former prostitute, hopes the awareness campaign tied to this year’s Super Bowl will help change society’s perceptions of underage girls in the sex trade.

“I believed that I was making a choice. You have to tell yourself that to survive,” she said. “I want people to see these girls as victims. They’re not criminals, not bad kids. They are lost and broken.”

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Atlanta — The L.A. Times is reporting on a story about Keith Fitzhugh, who turned down a chance to play for the New York Jets to work as a railroad conductor and spend time with his mother and father in Atlanta.

This week, the Jets made an offer to the free agent safety to join them as they make a run toward the playoffs and a possible Super Bowl berth.

He turned them down.

“I know I haven’t won a Super Bowl; it would be a once-in-a-lifetime chance,” Fitzhugh said. “But you only get one mom and one dad. That’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance. I’d rather be there for my mom and dad.”

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We’re going to the Super Bowl.

In New Jersey. In February!

NFL owners voted Tuesday to put the 2014 Super Bowl in the new $1.6 billion Meadowlands Stadium that this season will become home to the New York Jets and Giants. It’s the first time the league has gone to a cold weather site that doesn’t have a dome and, until now, those places couldn’t even bid on the big game.

The league made an exception for the New York area, and New York only. But just a few years ago, the NHL experimented with an outdoor game on New Year’s Day, and it was such a success that teams now fight to host what’s become an annual event.

“We believe the owners have the faith in us that 3½ years from now we’ll put on a remarkable event,” Giants co-owner Jonathan Tisch said on the NFL Network. “The greatest game in the world will be played on the greatest stage in the world.”

Text continues after gallery …

For all the hoopla on putting the Super Bowl in the Big Apple, it wasn’t a slam-dunk. It took four votes by NFL owners to pick New Jersey over two Florida cities, Miami and Tampa. Miami was eliminated after the second ballot.

If the NFL decides to wait and see how this foray into the great outdoors in winter goes, it could be until about 2019 or 2020 to try again because it takes a year or two to put together a bid for a game that’s another four years away.

The slogan for New York’s bid is “Make Some History.” The first piece likely to be made is a record-low temperature at kickoff. The current record is 39 degrees in 1972 at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, and that would be considered a warm February day in East Rutherford, N.J.

There’s never been snow in a Super Bowl game and that could happen, too.

The average temperature range for the Meadowlands area during February is 24 to 40 degrees, with several inches of rain, according to the bid documents. Remember, the game kicks off after sunset in the Eastern time zone, so temperatures would be dropping throughout the night.

Planners have factored it all in. They’re plotting giveaways to warm hands and seats, having hundreds of folks ready to shovel away snow and anything else they can do to make the experience more than just bearable.

For all the inconvenience to those in the stadium, it might look great on TV.

Think of all the shots from the “Ice Bowl” with steam coming out of players’ mouths. More recently, there was the snowy game in New England that became known for the “Tuck Rule.”

Of course, this game also will have the glitz and spectacle that comes with being just outside New York City — like having the Manhattan skyline in the distance. There were cheers in Times Square as the decision was announced on jumbo-screen TVs.

Jets owner Woody Johnson wasted no time in raising the possibility of a Jets-Giants showdown in four years.

“We’ll try to be in that Super Bowl together,” he said, then turned to Tisch. “Am I right?”

Being in the big city will give the league a chance to try making the big game even bigger, if that’s even possible. Buildup will include everything from a float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade to parties at internationally renowned destinations.

The flip side is that security will become a bigger issue, perhaps among the most expensive pieces of the budget. An expected economic impact of $550 million would help offset some of the cost.

Still, it’s the weather that makes this decision so significant.

The NFL traditionally has required an average temperature of 50 degrees or a dome for a team to bid on hosting the Super Bowl. The rule was made for the comfort and convenience of fans and players. Anyone who has ever planned an outdoor event can appreciate how much of a relief it is to not worry about the weather. Neutral conditions, like those in a dome, also are supposed to help the caliber of play.

It’s been at least 57 degrees for every Super Bowl since 1975, when it was 46. Both that game and the record-low in ’72 were in New Orleans, before the Superdome opened.

Something else to consider is that hosting a Super Bowl involves a lot more than the game itself. The week before is filled with practices, parties and the league’s popular “NFL Experience,” a carnival-like event with games, souvenirs and much more.

Florida, California and domed stadiums were part of an informal rotation for many years. With more cities building big, expensive stadiums, more places want their turn to host.

Yet some places with new or newly renovated facilities haven’t even had a chance to bid before because of their weather, such as Washington, Philadelphia, Chicago, New England, Seattle, Denver and Green Bay. Surely they will use this precedent to change, or at least loosen, the 50-degree rule for Super Bowl bids.

The upcoming Super Bowl, in February 2011, will be at Cowboys Stadium, followed by Indianapolis’ new stadium in 2012 and a 2013 return to the Superdome for the first time since Hurricane Katrina ripped off part of the roof.

For now, a question: Anybody have a 1,300-day forecast?

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NEW ORLEANS — Another jolt of Saints euphoria is on tap for New Orleans Tuesday when the Super Bowl champs board floats borrowed from Mardi Gras krewes for a victory parade through the grateful city.

The Carnival-flavored parade honoring the team’s 31-17 win over the Indianapolis Colts is scheduled to start in the afternoon at their home turf, the Louisiana Superdome. It will include 12 marching bands and one float each from 10 krewes. Float builder Barry Kern said he believes it’s the first time the groups — which celebrate Carnival season with separate parades — will combine floats in one procession.

On Monday, swarms of fans in black and gold greeted the players as they stepped off a chartered plane at the suburban airport, cheering them with “Who Dat!” chants. The Saints, cellar dwellers for decades, delivered not just their first Lombardi trophy but optimism for the city still recovering from Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

RELATED: New Orleans Saints Beat Colts For First Super Bowl Win, 31-17

“The Saints kept hope alive in this city that better days were coming,” said Shannon Sims, a 45-year-old criminal court administrator, as she waited for the team. She said the Saints “were the force that kept us moving forward.”

The win was not just about football for New Orleans, said John Magill, a historian at Historic New Orleans Collection.

“We’re all being told that we’re sinking, why bother rebuild it, there was so much of that attitude,” Magill said. Thanks to the Super Bowl win, he said, Americans will view the city in the positive light it deserves.

Sunday’s victory came a day after New Orleans elected a new mayor and several other city officials. But in the area newspapers on Monday there was little besides the Saints.

The New Orleans paper, The Times-Picayune, ran a 5-inch headline that said “AMEN.” The subhead read, “After 43 years, our prayers are answered.”

RELATED: Saints’ Super Bowl Victory A Symbol Of Resilience For Lower Ninth Ward

At Lakeside News, which usually sells about 100 copies a day, owner Michael Marcello said he had sold 6,000 to 7,000 by 9:15 a.m.

“I wish I had some,” he said. “I’m out again. This is the fourth time I’ve run out.”

Thousands of fans lined the road outside the airport with their Saints jerseys, “Who Dat!” chants, homemade signs, fleur-de-lis garb, face paint and Mardi Gras costumes (like the Saint-a Claus fellow). Coach Sean Payton held the Lombardi trophy aloft through the sunroof of his car, eliciting wild screams.

At the airport, 37-year-old courier Aaron Washington said “the dawn of a new day” had come. A brass-band version of “When the Saints Go Marching In” blared from his car stereo.

“This team has allowed us to get past Katrina and look forward to better things,” Washington said. He watched the game with dozens of friends and relatives on a big-screen television in front of a home in eastern New Orleans that was rebuilt after the 2005 hurricane flooded it with 9 feet of water.

Check out the pictures of the New Orleans Saints’ historic Super Bowl victory!

Are you from New Orleans? How did you celebrate the victory?

The thousands of the Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts shirts, that were made irrelevant by the New Orleans Saints, will be donated to Haiti. Usually the shirts from the teams that didn’t win the Super Bowl are donated to a third world country. The Colts may have some fans in Haiti, as Pierre Garcon, who caught the only receiving touchdown from the Colts of Haitian heritage.

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Saints’ Super Bowl Victory A Symbol Of Resilience For Lower Ninth Ward

From CNN.com:

New Orleans, Louisiana (CNN) — Three people were shot amid celebrations surrounding the New Orleans Saints’ Super Bowl win, police said Monday.

The shootings occurred at about midnight, at the intersection of Iberville and Bourbon streets, in the Crescent City’s French Quarter, authorities said in a statement.

None of the victims — a 25-year-old man, a 30-year-old woman and a 36-year-old woman — had life-threatening injuries, New Orleans, Louisiana, police said.

Text continues after gallery…

The 25-year-old was shot in his right ankle and both women were shot in their left shin. All three were treated and released in good condition.

Click here to read more.

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From the NY Daily News:

NEW ORLEANS – Roy Bradley couldn’t sit still.

First he took a chair next to Mack Young, a friend from the Lower Ninth Ward. Then he ambled to the kitchen. Then he went outside to call his wife. Now, he was back inside. Bradley removed his Saints hard hat from his head and stared intently at the coin toss on a 64-inch flat screen TV. Then, just as the Saints elected to receive the kickoff, he jumped out of his seat and strolled to the kitchen again, refilled his black and gold Saints glass.

Hours later, when the seconds ticked down and a stunning 31-17 Saints Super Bowl victory was in hand, Bradley – who had lost his home in the Lower Ninth to Hurricane Katrina – sprang out of his seat and disappeared, whooping and hollering, into the New Orleans night.

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From the Washington Post:

MIAMI, Fla. — Who Dat won the Super Bowl? The New Orleans Saints, that’s who.

Ain’t kidding. Put away those paper bags forever: Drew Brees and the Saints are NFL champions, rallying to beat Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts 31-17 Sunday night in one of pro football’s most thrilling title games.

Brees tied a Super Bowl record with 32 completions, the last a 2-yard slant to Jeremy Shockey for the winning points with 5:42 remaining. The Pro Bowl quarterback was chosen Super Bowl MVP.

New Orleans’ lowly ranked defense made several key stops, an onside kick sparked their second-half comeback, and Tracy Porter’s 74-yard interception return on a pass from Manning, of all people, clinched it.

Click here to read more.

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From The Arizona Daily Star

Comcast believes the pornography that interrupted its feed of the Super Bowl Sunday night was the result of foul play, a company spokeswoman said Monday morning.

Read The Report Here

Gold and black-clad fans with Steelers’ iconic Terrible Towels waving in the air or tucked into their back pockets partied into the early morning hours Monday in an impromptu block party across Pittsburgh to celebrate the team’s historic sixth Super Bowl win.

Thousands of people gathered in the city’s Oakland neighborhood near the University of Pittsburgh and also along the quirky strip of bars known as the South Side. City officials had anticipated the large crowds, and had about 400 police on the streets as a precaution.

Moments after the Steelers sealed the 27-23 victory over the Arizona Cardinals in Tampa, Fla., revelers poured out of area bars, and some broke out in song, bellowing Queen’s “We are the Champions.”

Yellow confetti swirled in the air, people released gold and black balloons and Super Bowl championship paraphernalia was up for sale in the middle of the street.

Pittsburgh police didn’t report any major problems, but there were pockets of trouble, mostly in the Oakland section.

Police arrested more than 100 people for failing to disperse from various locations, at least one for arson, and two others for drunken driving. Couches and several garbage containers were set on fire, and several vehicles were overturned as police responded to more than 400 emergency calls during the game and a similar number in the 2 1/2 hours after it ended, city police spokeswoman Diane Richard said.

One officer suffered a possible broken arm and some revelers broke windows, threw bottles at police — including a state trooper on horseback — and engaged in fights, Richard said. Large numbers of police in riot gear and on horseback were out in force, surrounding one fire and keeping the crowd back in an effort to let it burn out.

Police in riot gear patrolled the South Side on bikes and in cars, letting the loud and rowdy celebration run its course.

Mayor Luke Ravenstahl told The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that some sort of city celebration would likely be held Tuesday or Wednesday, but details still need to be worked out.

Crowds spilled out of the doors of Primanti Bros., Pittsburgh’s famous gut-busting sandwich shop.

Rocky Plassio, a 32-year-old high school teacher from the suburb of Washington, had his 3-year-old son, Noah, perched on his shoulders. The elder Plassio made sure his son didn’t miss the celebration.

“The last time the Steelers won, he was an infant,” Rocky said. “If you’re from Pittsburgh, the Steelers are really part of your culture. It’s in your blood.”

Nearby, Jim Jacobs, 43, had his 8-year-old son, Marcus, on his shoulders and 9-year-old Luke by his side. They traveled from the suburb of Mt. Washington and, even when the Steelers were losing late in the game, Marcus was preparing for the celebration.

“We’re going to have a hard time getting them up for school tomorrow, and they are home schooled,” Jim Jacobs said about 90 minutes after the game ended.

Brittany Barcoay, 21, drove seven hours from Liberty University in Virginia just to be in her hometown for the Super Bowl and celebrated outside the South Side bar Town Tavern, which sported a “Steeler Tavern” banner.

“I have never had so much pride in my city, ever,” said Barcoay, decked out in a Jerome Bettis jersey.

Bars were packed in the area popular with college students and the 20-something crowd, with music blaring.

One man carried a life-size cutout of President Barack Obama, with a Terrible Towel draped around the neck, while a one-man band played in the middle of a blocked-off street and photos of players were projected onto the sides of buildings.

Dan Decriscio, 51, returned to Pittsburgh from Philadelphia and had the chance to celebrate yet another NFL title.

“This is awesome,” Decriscio said. “I’ve been here for every Super Bowl. Every one is great. From the first one with Chuck Noll to Mike Tomlin; this is Christmas in February.”

In one neighborhood south of Pittsburgh, people lit fireworks and ran outside and cheered after the game.

When the Steelers last won the Super Bowl in 2006, thousands of drunken fans celebrated in the streets and several small fires were set.

Pittsburgh schools delayed openings two hours Monday to allow for the celebration, but other schools were following suit after the victory. TV news stations were scrolling school delays for Monday as if it were a snow day.

In her first public appearance since the tragic murders of her mother, brother and nephew in October, Oscar winner and “American Idol” vet Jennifer Hudson gave a stunning performance of the national anthem before the Super Bowl on Sunday (February 1).

Stepping onto a small blue platform, Hudson took a deep breath and leaned easily into the microphone, letting loose her signature crystalline vocals on the country’s anthem, bringing the song a dreamy quality that rivaled one of the other great renditions of the anthem at the big game: Whitney Houston’s legendary soul shakedown in 1991 during the first Gulf War.

Confident and immaculately turned out in a dark blue military style jacket, long white top and black leggings, Hudson gave a performance for the ages, easily hitting the song’s notoriously tricky melody and nailing a pair of long notes at the end that sent shivers through the TV. Pouring her heart into the music on the year’s largest TV stage, Hudson instantly set a new standard.

Before Hudson took the stage, Faith Hill performed “America the Beautiful” accompanied by a gospel choir. Stretching the tempo out to give the song a more soulful, gospel feel, the country star wowed the crowd as the choir rose to crescendo behind her. Amping up the good spirits, the crew of the US Airways flight 1549, which made a safe emergency landing in New York’s Hudson River last month, came out for a moment in the spotlight.

Hudson had been in virtual seclusion since the murders, but began a tentative step back into the spotlight last week when she began filming the long-delayed video for her single, “If This Isn’t Love.” The Super Bowl slot is the lead-up to her appearance at the Grammy Awards on February 8, where she is nominated for four awards for her self-titled debut.

Barack Obama has made it clear who he is rooting for in the Superbowl in a press conference broadcast on CNN.

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