New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan late in the...

New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan late in the AFC Championship game against the Indianapolis Colts. (January 24, 2010) Credit: Newsday/ Thomas A. Ferrara

The last time the Jets got this close to the Super Bowl, it took them 11 years to get back.

It will not take this team nearly as long.

There, I said it. I know this is the Jets, the Same Old Jets, the Just-End-the-Season Jets, the Jets of Rich Kotite and Bruce Coslet and Eric Mangini, the Jets of Broadway Joe Namath followed by a procession, it seems, of Al Woodalls and Browning Nagles; the Jets who couldn't even keep Bill Belichick on the job for 24 hours and had to find out he was jilting them via an awkward, hand-scrawled note left on a podium that was supposed to be the site of a celebration.

And I realize that if you're old enough to remember Super Bowl III and have suffered through the next four decades of failure and heartbreak, you no doubt are thinking you've already seen the best of this Jets incarnation and are just waiting for it all, inevitably, to fall apart.

Well, I hate to disappoint you, because sometimes it seems as if Jets fans are as happy in their misery as Red Sox fans once were in theirs, but I believe this team is going to turn out differently.

You may think Sunday's 30-17 loss to the Indianapolis Colts - which, naturally, had some eerie parallels to the Jets' 23-10 loss to the Broncos in the 1998 AFC Championship Game, in which the Jets also were leading only 30 minutes from the Super Bowl - was just the latest in what seems an endless string of bitter disappointments.

Au contraire, mes frères et soeurs.

In fact, this Jets run, cut short as it was, was the feel-good story of the New York sports year, even more fun and satisfying, in its way, than the Yankees' run to the world championship less than three months ago.

The reason, of course, is because this Jets team, with a rookie quarterback, a rookie coach and new systems on both sides of the ball, really had no business even making the playoffs, let alone coming within one good half of football of going all the way to Super Bowl XLIV.

And the way they did it made it even more satisfying, rallying from a Week 15 loss so bad that even their ebullient coach declared their season was over. With some help from Colts coach Jim Caldwell, they rose from the dead. Right to the end - trailing the Colts by two touchdowns with less than two minutes to go - there was the rookie quarterback on the sideline, slapping his linemen on the shoulder pads, bumping helmets, exhorting them to give it one more try.

This wasn't Carlos Beltran, the best hitter on the best team in the National League, watching the 2006 season end with the bat on his shoulder. It wasn't the Giants, who talk a lot tougher than they play, rolling over in the final two games of their season by a combined score of 85-16, including the final game at the stadium that bore their name.

And it wasn't the Yankees, with their $200-million payroll and lineup full of All-Stars, steamrolling the Twins, the Angels and the Phillies.

This was a team that played beyond its abilities and bigger than its considerable heart.

And the reasons why it will not end here can be summed up in six words. Mark Sanchez. Darrelle Revis. Rex Ryan.

That is a nucleus around which to build an offense, a defense and a winning attitude.

For all his stumbles midway through the season, is there any doubt that Sanchez is a better quarterback than Eli Manning was at the same stage of their careers?

Revis, of course, is the kind of standout player around whom a smashmouth defense can be built, like Lawrence Taylor or Ray Lewis.

And what can you say about Ryan that the big guy hasn't already said about himself? By Week 1, it was apparent that he already was changing the culture around the Jets. This offseason, all he has to do is upgrade the defense, which by comparison should be a snap.

In his first year on the job, he won over his players and also caught up to and passed the New England Patriots. Now, for next year, he sets his sights even higher. "Next year,'' he said, "we're the biggest show in town.''

That means you, Giants, and why not? Woody Johnson and John Mara may have to play nice, being partners in a new stadium and all, but Ryan doesn't have to be partners with Tom Coughlin, the Giants' colorless coach. Head to head, it's a personality mismatch, and on the field, it looks as if it may be one, too.

For the first time since 1969, this might be a Jets town again.

"Next season doesn't start out with the AFC Championship Game,'' Ryan cautioned Monday. "We're 0-0 like everyone else. Nothing is guaranteed."

No guarantees, of course. But plenty of hope. When's the last time Jets fans could say that?

Get the latest news and more great videos at NewsdayTV Credit: Newsday

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