It was close….but the Saints pulled one hell of a close game. It took going to overtime, but the Saints came back from being down from 10 points down twice to beat the Washington Redskins 33-30. This was another tough test for the Saints, which are no stranger to coming back from small to very learge debts to end the game with a victory.

The biggest play came down to a time out that Coach Sean Payton of the Saints made in overtime. Since there are no challenges in overtime the time out allowed for the officials to review the play multiple times before the time out ended and once the time out was concluded, the call that the Redskins’ runningback arm was down before the ball came out was overruled in favor of the Saints who received the ball with very good field position. This allowed the Saints to push the ball up the field to the one yard line and from there kick a field goal to give the Saints a miraculous come from behind win against the Redskins to keep their unbeaten season alive.

The game did not come with out it’s heroes.

Here are the Star Studded Saints from Week 13 against the Redskins:

Quarterback, Drew Brees who tallied a total of 419 yards on 35/49 pass completion, and throwing 2 touchdowns to only 1 interceptions. Brees also was able to keep his outstanding quarterback rating red hot with 102.3!

Runningback Pierre Thomas only rushed the ball six times for 18 yards but what made him stand out was that he caught the ball eight times from eight targets from Brees to amount 64 yards receiving.

Probably the biggest star of the night was wide receiver Robert Meachem, who had the play of the game. When Brees threw an interceptions to safety Kareem Moore of the Redskins and while Moore was returning the interception Meachem ran back ot catch up to Moore and snare the ball out of the grips of Moore and return the ball all the way to the endzone!. Meachem could very well have had his coming out party last week as he totaled  8 receptions  on 10 targets to achieve a staggering 142 yards - along with the aformentioned fumbled recovery returned to for touchdown.

Fellow wide out Devery Henderson did not disppoint as he managed to bring in 6 receptions for 61 yards on 8 targets.

Rookie cornerback  Malcolm Jenkins has proven that when given the playing time has been worthy of his first round selection in this past years NFL Draft. Last week against the Redskins he managed to obtain 9 tackles, all solo as well as 1 pass deflection and a tackle for a loss of yards. Jenkins’ development will be crucial to the Saints weathering their secondary injuries they are facing now with Jabari Greer out for at least 3 more games, Tracy Porter, and Randal Gay are both still out of commission.

Defensive Tackle Sedrick Ellis gave the Saints a much needed push on the defensive front by tallying  6 tackles, all solo and flushing the Redskins’ quarterback Jason Campbell out of the pocket from time to time. Ellis’ growth and maturation is evident in the past couple of weeks and will be expected of him to continue his dominance in the trenches if the Saints want to make a serious run in the playoffs and not be a team with just a good record.

Another defensive tackle had a good performance last week as Remi Ayodele had six tackles, five of which were solo and one tackle for loss of yards.

Lastly there was Jonathon Vilma who played a very well rounded game at middle linebacker for the Saints last weekend. Vilma made five tackles and all of them were solo as well as obtaining one pass deflection and one interception returned for eight yards.

Adding this list to the the total here are the new standings…..

(8) QB Drew Brees

(8) SS Roman Harper

(8) RB Pierre Thomas

(7) SS Darren Sharper

(7) MLB Jonathon Vilma

(6) WR Marques Colston

(5) Defense

(5) O-Line

(4) RB Mike Bell

(4) WR Devery Henderson

(4) DE Will Smith

(3) CB Jabari Greer

(3) FS Tracy Porter

(3) TE Jeremy Shockey

(3) RB Reggie Bush

(3) KR Courtney Roby

(3) LB Scott Fujita

(3) CB Malcolm Jenkins

(2) OL Jermon Bushrod

(2) Robert Meachem

(2) P Thomas Morstead

(2) TE David Thomas

(1) LB Jo-Lonn Dunbar

(1) DE Charles Grant

(1) WR  Lance Moore

(1) LB Scott Shanle

(1) CB Usama Young

(1) DT Remi Ayodele

(1) DT Sedrick Ellis

The Saints play the Falcons this week in a critical match up for the Flacons if they wish to keep their faint play off hope alive. Go Saints!!!!