Philadelphia, PA (My Sportsbook) - There are two NFL franchises that have been in continuous existence during every year of the Super Bowl era but have not participated in a game held on Super Sunday.

One is the Detroit Lions, who nearly blew up survivor pools from coast to coast on Sunday by taking the Chicago Bears to the wire, before eventually turning back into the rancid, week-old Halloween pumpkin that they are. The Lions will be in the Super Bowl at some point, and we all look forward to that day since it figures to correspond with the development of hovercraft technology, the three-minute mile, and time travel.

The other organization that has never made a Super Bowl is the Arizona Cardinals, though this long-beleaguered franchise might make it to the sport's biggest stage some time before my three-week old daughter starts receiving her AARP Magazine.

In fact, by the looks of it, they might be in the Super Bowl before she learns to talk.

The Cardinals moved to 5-3 with their 34-13 win at the St. Louis Rams on Sunday, remaining well above the fray in an NFC West division that looks a little like the cast of Entourage...one guy who can sorta act, and three others who are unwatchable.

The Rams are 2-6, the Seahawks share that record after losing at home to Philadelphia on Sunday, and the similarly 2-6 49ers can better describe the contours of Mike Singletary's posterior than diagnose a Cover-2 defense.

If the Cardinals don't emerge from this group and notch their first division title since winning the NFC East in 1975 (as the St. Louis Cardinals), then something cataclysmic will have happened in the season's second half.

A 5-3 record in the next two months should be plenty for Ken Whisenhunt's team to bring a division title and playoff game home to Arizona for the first time, but laying up and coasting into January would be a missed opportunity for the Cardinals.

Because this Arizona team has an opportunity to be so much more than "better than usual."

Look at the way the schedule shakes out.

Five of Arizona's last eight are at home, and the Cardinals (3-0 at home this year) will probably be favored to win all but one of those games, against the Giants on Nov. 23. Manage to run the table at home, and you've got 10 wins.

Then there are the three remaining road games, at Seattle (11/16), Philadelphia (11/27) and New England (12/21). Realistically, the Cardinals will be fortunate to get one win out of that trio, since Arizona is 2-3 away from University of Phoenix Stadium and has been particularly inconsistent on the east coast.

That said, 11 wins might be enough to get the Cardinals the No. 2 seed and an all-important first-round bye in the NFC Playoffs. The Saints were the second seed at 10-6 a couple of years ago, and given that the teams from the other three jumbled NFC divisions look set to beat up on one another for the next eight weeks, 11-5 could put Arizona in a favorable position to make a run.

Seattle did something similar in 2005, going 13-3 in an otherwise horrid division (the Rams finished second at 6-10), earning the No. 1 seed, and subsequently not having to test their troubled road reputation until departing for Detroit and the Super Bowl.

But it's not all about scoreboard-watching and jockeying for position for the 2008 Cardinals, who happen to be a fine football team.

The proficiency of the passing attack has been well-chronicled. With Anquan Boldin healthy and Larry Fitzgerald still lining up opposite him, 37-year-old Kurt Warner is looking every bit like the Pro Bowler he was in his Rams days.

Warner's 342-yard outing on Sunday was his fourth 300-plus game of the season, and the veteran threw multiple touchdown passes for the seventh time this year.

Whisenhunt also made an important and prudent decision at running back on Sunday, replacing the severely declining Edgerrin James with flashy rookie Tim Hightower, the fifth-round pick out of Richmond. Hightower made Whisenhunt's decision count to the tune of 109 yards on 22 carries against the Rams, and his ability to keep defenses honest will only be a credit to the NFL's No. 1 scoring offense (29.3 points per game).

Meanwhile, though the Cardinals are hardly synonymous with defense, they have some playmakers on that side of the ball as well.

Safety Adrian Wilson, tackle Darnell Dockett and outside linebacker Karlos Dansby are all top-tier talents and proven playmakers.

The coverage group is subject to giving up a big play (or in Brett Favre's case, six big plays), but players like Rod Hood and Antrel Rolle are also capable of changing a game with a turnover. Rolle, the former first-round pick, added value on Sunday with a 40-yard interception return for a touchdown to open the scoring for Arizona.

Bottom line...they're good enough defensively to get by.

Perhaps more important for the Cardinals than the vagaries of offensive and defensive personnel will be its ability to somehow avoid falling into the vortex that has consumed this franchise for the better part of four decades.

Years and years of bad coaching hires, terrible draft picks, shaky management and clueless, penny-pinching ownership have put this team in a situation where it now needs to forget it is the Arizona Cardinals and play the role of some other, well-respected organization.

Whisenhunt's job isn't finished yet, but his effort to change the culture in the desert looks to be on the brink of paying dividends. No matter where the 2008 journey ends, there is no reason why this season can't be the start of an unprecedented run of success for the Cardinals.

Long-suffering Cardinals fans have heard all of this before, of course, so a team that is almost annually tabbed to climb the ladder must set about the business of actually climbing those rungs.

The top of the ladder is Super Bowl XLIII in Tampa on Feb. 1, and after an interminable wait, these Cardinals look like they might have a shot to finally see that breathtaking view.