STANDING ON the podium at Miami’s Sun Life Stadium and clutching American football’s greatest prize, New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson found the appropriate words. “We’re back,” he yelled towards the black-and-gold clad horde that had descended from all over the stadium to squeeze into the front few rows. “We’re back! We’re back!”

Benson was speaking not just for his team but for the whole city of New Orleans. Five years on from Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans is still working to undo some of the damage, but the people who live there are now back on their feet. For them, a 31-17 win over the Indianapolis Colts in Super Bowl XLIV was symbolic of that and deeply cathartic.

“It means everything,” said Saints quarterback Drew Brees after collecting the game’s Most Valuable Player award. “We’re here because of (the people of New Orleans’s) strength and everything they fought through over the last few years. They’ve given us so much support, and so we owe it all to our fans.”

When Brees joined the team in 2006, the Saints were homeless, having spent 2005 in San Antonio while the Louisiana Superdome, itself heavily damaged by the hurricane, was used as shelter for people whose houses had been destroyed. There was talk of the team relocating permanently to another state, but the decision was taken to return, and to try to offer something positive for the community to rally around.

The team’s first game back in New Orleans at the beginning of the 2006 season drew a capacity crowd of more than 70,000, and ESPN’s best-ever TV audience. But few could have envisaged that a victory like Sunday’s would be possible in the proceeding few years. The Saints had finished their season in San Antonio with the NFL’s second-worst record, winning just three of 16 games.

In fact, the Saints, formed in 1967, had never gone to a Super Bowl before. Once there, few outside of New Orleans gave them much chance against a Colts team whose only defeats had come in the last two games of the regular season, when key starters were rested.

The game was billed as a shoot-out between Brees and the Colts’ quarterback, Peyton Manning, and few expected the Saints’ signal caller to prevail. Though Brees had posted the league’s best passer rating in the regular season, Manning already had one Super Bowl victory to his name and this year claimed the league’s Most Valuable Player award for a record fourth time.

Brees, however, wound up equalling a Super Bowl record with 32 completions and, crucially, throwing for two touchdowns. He had looked anxious early on, missing open receivers more than once, but finished with 10 successive completions.

Manning effectively sealed his team’s fate by throwing the game’s only interception – returned 74 yards for a score by Tracy Porter – to put his team down 14 points with less than four minutes left.

“We just continued to believe in ourselves and, sure enough, we trusted in one another and our offence got it going,” said Brees, reflecting on his team’s recovery from an initial 10-0 deficit.

But the greatest accolade should perhaps go to head coach Sean Payton, whose bold decision to attempt an onside kick at the beginning of the second half was the game’s defining moment. The kick was recovered by the Saints, who moved swiftly down the field for a touchdown that gave them their first lead of the game.

“I think I could kiss him,” said Benson.

The rest of New Orleans feels the same.

• Guardian Service