A few weeks ago, if someone had asked me to pick the Final Four in the NFL, I would only have picked one correctly, and then mostly out of loyalty to the Steelers rather than any sense of conviction, especially after their loss to Tennessee in week 16.  Today, though, all of the other favorites have left the playoffs, and the challenge for the two divisional champions left is to win at home — a challenge that has mostly been unmet this year.

Let’s start with Philadelphia at Arizona.  The Cardinals appeared to run out of gas during the regular season, and took a beating from the Eagles on Thanksgiving that almost made Detroit look good.  They’ve bounced back in the playoffs with impressive wins over Atlanta at home and Carolina on the road, knocking out the #2 seed while the Eagles dispatched the #1 seeded Giants.  However, Donovan McNabb won’t play the worst game of his career as Jake Delhomme did last week for the Panthers.  He’s been to the dance before, and he won’t give the game away to Arizona.  It will be a close, high-scoring game — a shootout between McNabb and Kurt Warner, who’s also been to the dance a couple of times — but the Eagles will prevail, 35-31.

That brings us to Pittsburgh.  The Steelers wound up with home-field advantage throughout the playoffs when the Ravens did what the Steelers couldn’t do in Week 16 and beat the Titans.  However, the Steelers didn’t get beat up at all when they trounced the San Diego Chargers last week, while Baltimore barely survived that tough, emotional game against the Titans.  They got an extra day of rest, but that won’t be enough against the refreshed Steelers lines and running backs.  The Titans drove on the Ravens’ defense last week, and we can expect the Steelers to do the same, but score from the red zone more often than Tennessee did.  I’ll pick the Steelers 24-14 at home, making the upcoming Super Bowl an all-Pennsylvania affair.