Orleans Saints Lions

Orleans Saints Lions

New Orleans Saints

The Saints was founded in 1967, as an expansion team. The team went more than a decade before they managed to finish a season with a .500 record and two decades before having a winning season. The team's first successful years were from 1987–1992, when the team made the playoffs four times and had winning records in the non-playoff seasons. In the 2000 season, the Saints defeated the then-defending Super Bowl champion St. Louis Rams for the team's first playoff win.

The Saints' home stadium is the Louisiana Superdome; it started to play its home games in the "dome" since 1975. However, due to damage caused by Hurricane Katrina to the New Orleans area, the Saints' 2005 home opener was played at Giants Stadium against the New York Giants. The remainder of their 2005 home games were split between the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas, and LSU's Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. After a $185 million renovation of the historic stadium, the team returned to the Superdome for the 2006 season. The team played its 2006 home opener in front of a sold-out crowd and national television audience on September 25, 2006, defeating its NFC South rival, the Atlanta Falcons by a score of 23–3. The victory received a 2007 ESPY award for "Best Moment in Sports."

One of the franchise's brightest moments was on November 8, 1970, when Tom Dempsey kicked an NFL record-breaking 63-yard field goal to defeat the Detroit Lions by a score of 19-17 in the final seconds of the game. This record has yet to be broken, but was equaled 29 years later by Jason Elam of the Denver Broncos.

On December 17, 2006, the Saints clinched their third division title and their first NFC South title in franchise history. For the first time in Saints' history, they clinched their NFC South title on their home field. Sean Payton became the second consecutive Saints coach to win a division title in his first season.

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