HONOLULU — MVP DeAngelo Hall had one of his team's five interceptions and returned a fumble 34 yards for a touchdown to help the NFC match a Pro Bowl scoring record in a 55-41 victory over the turnover-prone AFC in a game that was not nearly as interesting as the final would indicate.
Two Jaguars made their presence known.
Jacksonville special-team ace Montell Owens recovered a fumble and returned it 8 yards for a touchdown in the third quarter. In the fourth quarter, Owens caught a 7-yard touchdown pass from Kansas City's Matt Cassel.
In the third quarter, Jaguars tight end Marcedes Lewis caught a 28-yard touchdown pass from San Diego's Philip Rivers.
AFC quarterbacks Philip Rivers, Peyton Manning and Matt Cassel each threw first-half interceptions to help the NFC blow open a 42-0 lead in a performance ugly even by the historically low standards of this game.
Fittingly for this strange contest, center Alex Mack of Cleveland scored the final touchdown on a 67-yard pass play that featured two laterals, one from Owens, with 16 seconds left.
Carolina's Jon Beason returned the fifth interception thrown by the AFC, and second by Cassel, 59 yards for the NFC's final touchdown to match the single-team scoring record set in the NFC's 55-52 victory in 2004.
New England coach Bill Belichick, after his Patriots lost to the New York Jets in the playoffs, had to watch his AFC squad muddle through the one-sided first half.
Rivers, starting in place of injured Tom Brady, was picked off twice in the first quarter, the second by Hall.
Manning, in his 11th Pro Bowl, came on briefly in relief and his second pass was picked off. Then Cassel got his chance and quickly joined in the spirit of things, throwing his second pass of the game directly into the hands of Minnesota cornerback Antoine Winfield.
But just when it appeared it would be the most one-sided game in Pro Bowl history, eclipsing the Joe Theismann-led 45-3 NFC rout of the AFC in 1984, the AFC scored three touchdowns in a row. The last came on the game&39;s seventh turnover, when Devin Hester tried to hand the kickoff return to Hall, but the ball fell to the turf. The Jaguars' Montell Owens scooped it up and ran it in 8 yards for the score to make it 42-21 with 10 minutes left in the third quarter.
With his seven extra points, tying a Pro Bowl record, along with two field goals David Akers moved ahead of Morten Andersen (45) for most Pro Bowl points with 52. The Philadelphia kicker would have had more but his 36-yard field goal try in the fourth quarter bounced off the right upright.
A tropical downpour preceded the game but subsided just before kickoff as the game returned to its traditional home in Hawaii after a one-year detour to Miami.
Eagles quarterback Michael Vick started but played only the first quarter, completing 5 of 10 passes for 59 yards.
Adrian Peterson rushed for 80 yards in 14 carries for the NFC, including a 14-yarder to set a Pro Bowl record with four career rushing touchdowns. Atlanta got good performances from Matt Ryan (9 of 13 for 118 yards and two touchdowns with an interception), Michael Turner (eight carries for 53 yards) and Roddy White (five catches for 69 yards).
