TAMPA, Fla. — Most longtime Washington Redskins followers have the image either framed on a wall if not burned forever into their memories: Running back John Riggins took a fourth-and-one handoff, raced through an attempted tackle by Miami Dolphins defensive back Don McNeal and dashed 43 yards to the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter of a victory in Super Bowl XVII.

Riggins knows what the moment meant.

"Clearly," he said here this week, "that changed my life."

The Pittsburgh Steelers and Arizona Cardinals will play in Super Bowl XLIII on Sunday before a crowd of more than 72,000 at Raymond James Stadium and a nationwide television audience of about 100 million. NBC, which is broadcasting the game, sold 30-second ad spots during its telecast for a record $3 million each, even amid an economic crisis.

The stakes are high in many ways.

Super Bowl Sunday is a day of myth-making. It is a day when reputations are made and broken, when lasting images are created.

"There's no other way around it," Riggins said as he sat in a room at the Tampa Convention Center last week. "If something else happens in that situation, say you don't make the yardage and they take over, they win the game, you become an afterthought because there's nothing really worse ... than being the team that loses.

"I would guess if Don McNeal had been able to come up and stick his helmet in my chest and drive me backwards and make the stop, I'd be the one that would be the afterthought, I guess. That's the nature of a sport, the moment that something happens that perhaps changes the outcome of a game. You're either the hero, or you're the goat."

Riggins defended McNeal, saying McNeal didn't have a clean shot at him and other defenders could have made the play. He's not calling McNeal the goat of that game, he added. But that doesn't change the image captured in the photographs, and in the mind's eye.

In Detroit three years ago, when the Steelers won their fifth Super Bowl title, the focal point was running back Jerome Bettis, who was playing his final NFL game.

"It is enormous," Bettis said. "To get the brunt of the Super Bowl attention pointed at you, it's a lot of heat. Win, lose or draw, it changes your life. For a lot of people in the country, it's the one time they pay attention to sports and the coverage of sports, the one time they watch it on TV or read the stories or watch the interviews. If you're the focal point in this game, everyone will remember you. Sometimes it's not for the right reason, but they will remember you."

The Buffalo Bills reached four straight Super Bowls in the early 1990s, a remarkable achievement. But they lost all four. So they are remembered by many for those losses, not as teams that came close to being one of the all-time dynasties.

"I don't know which one of those they remember," said Marv Levy, who coached those Bills teams. "Maybe some focus on one aspect of it, and some focus on the other aspect. When you lose it, yes, you have a period of mourning. You beat your mattress at night. You've got to get over it. Let it last 10 days. Then recognize the good. Then do something about it. Go back to work. Achieve something else.

"So I'll remember the good. I'm glad we made it. There's one way I can guarantee you'll never lose a Super Bowl game: Don't go to it."

Former Denver Broncos quarterback John Elway had the same stigma as a Super Bowl loser until finishing his career with consecutive triumphs in the big game. Doug Williams will be forever remembered as the first African American quarterback to win a Super Bowl, and Tony Dungy as the first African American coach to win one.

There are one-hit wonders like former Redskins running back and Super Bowl hero Timmy Smith, and all-time blunders like former Dallas Cowboys defensive lineman Leon Lett losing a fumble and a touchdown because he showboated in a blowout victory over the Bills and had the ball stripped by Don Beebe.

Would Joe Namath remain such a legendary figure to this day without his prescient victory guarantee before Super Bowl III?

Last year was the Super Bowl of New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning proving his championship mettle and the New England Patriots failing to complete a perfect season. But it also was the Super Bowl of David Tyree, a little-known wide receiver for the Giants who made a play for the ages by trapping the ball against the top of his helmet for a catch that set up the game-winning touchdown.

Tyree, to that point, was known mostly for his ability to play on special teams, racing downfield to make tackles on punts and kickoffs, not for his pass-catching contributions on offense. This season, he didn't even play because of injuries. But he always will have a place in NFL lore, thanks to that catch. He wrote a book; not many wide receivers with 54 regular season catches on their NFL resumes get to be authors.

For Tyree, his greatest moment professionally came at a time of personal grief. Late in the 2007 regular season, he was pulled out of a team meeting and told his mother had died of a heart attack. The two events will be forever linked in his memories.

"There was a lot of trial there," Tyree said this week. "It couldn't have ended up better for me in terms of what happened on the football field. But you miss those moments with your mother. That's who you want to share it with."

He was back in the Super Bowl environment last week, leaving behind the snow in New Jersey to travel Wednesday to Tampa. He spent part of his day Thursday speaking emotionally of his mother at an event promoting heart health for women, then made the rounds on radio row at the Super Bowl media center. All anyone wanted to talk about was his catch.

"It wasn't me that changed," Tyree said. "It's how people perceived me. I still take it all in. It's a very humbling experience. It was such a big thing in the NFL and in the history of the NFL, if you listen to the way people talked about it. I'm just trying to be a good steward of it. It's a blessing that was given to me.

"I want to go forth and do greater things in my life. But as far as the way people remember me, I'm sure it's gonna be for a ball stuck to my head."