By Ron Kantowski

Thu, Jan 31, 2008 (2 a.m.)

As hard as it is to attain, perfection comes in many sizes, shapes and forms.

There is the perfect game. The perfect alibi. The perfect storm. If you are a swordfish boat captain or a George Clooney fan, you will probably want to avoid the last one.

The past can be perfect. The future can be perfect, too, especially when you are conjugating verbs. In that way, striving for perfection can make you tense.

Perfect cadence? I’ve heard of that, too. In music. It’s usually preceded by a dominant harmony.

Which brings us to the New England Patriots. The Pats have been singing a dominant harmony since the start of training camp. They are 18-0. One way or another, their pursuit of perfection will end Sunday in Super Bowl XLII. Will the Patriots come up with the perfect ending to a perfect season? The oddsmakers think so. They’ve established New England as a 12-point favorite.

As for the other team, the um ... uh ... wait, I’ve got it here somewhere ... the Giants — well, Eli’s comin’ so hide your heart, girl. And your eyes, too, because it remains to be seen how much longer he can go without throwing the ball to the other team.

If you are a Giants fan, or have money on them, you can continue to believe in Eli Manning or in the adage that nobody’s perfect — even when sports has shown that every once in a while, somebody is.

Miami Dolphins, 1972

How good were the ’72 Dolphins?

So good they could withstand an injury to their All-Pro quarterback Bob Griese in Week 5 and still go undefeated.

So good that even with journeyman Earl Morrall getting all the reps at quarterback, only three of their regular-season games were decided by less than a touchdown.

So good they were able to survive what was arguably the worst pass in the history of mankind, at least if you don’t count Lyle Lovett’s marriage proposal to Julia Roberts.

I’m not sure what that was when Garo Yepremian, the Dolphins’ kicker, tried to unload the football like it had cooties on it during Super Bowl VII, only to have the Redskins’ Mike Bass take it the other way for a touchdown.

But whatever that was, it couldn’t have made the No-Name Defense happy.

Don Larsen, 1956

There have been only 17 official perfect games — 27 up, 27 down — in Major League Baseball history. And only one in the World Series.

In Game 2 of the 1956 Fall Classic, Larsen, pitching for the New York Yankees, lasted less than two innings against the Bums from Brooklyn.

He lasted a little longer in Game 5.

In the seventh inning, with none of the Dodgers having yet reached base, he went to the clubhouse to smoke a cigarette. In the ninth, he painted the black on the outside corner — the way outside corner, as some insist to this day that the last pitch of Larsen’s Perfecto came closer to crossing Hoboken than it did home plate.

No matter. Dale Long took it, Babe Pinelli called it a

st-e-e-e-rike and Yogi Berra ran out from home plate to jump into Larsen’s arms, like a bride at the threshold.

Nobody has matched Larsen since. Not even Roger Clemens with a loaded syringe of dietary supplements.

Christian Laettner, 1992

His buzzer-beating jump shot from the top of the key was the perfect ending to Duke’s 104-103 victory over Kentucky in the 1992 Eastern Regional final — considered by many the greatest basketball game ever played.

Others may not recall that Laettner’s last-second dagger also capped what may have been basketball’s equivalent of the perfect game — he made all 20 shots he attempted against the gritty Wildcats, going 10-for-10 from the field and 10-for-10 from the free-throw line.

Watching Laettner shoot the rock at The Spectrum was like watching Michelangelo take a paint brush to the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Only he didn’t have Rick Pitino’s defense hacking him on the arm.

Nearly two decades earlier, Bill Walton made 21 of 22 shots from the field to power UCLA to an 87-66 victory over Memphis State in the NCAA championship game. Some say Walton’s 44-point effort was the greatest offensive performance in basketball history.

But it wasn’t perfect.

Bob Beamon, 1968

In 1968, Bob Beamon broke the world record in the long jump by 21 3/4 inches — nearly 2 feet.

Two feet!

Beamon jumped so far at the Olympic Games in Mexico City that the optical equipment of the time couldn’t measure it. It had to be confirmed with a tape measure, old-school style.

With one flying leap, Beamon surpassed both the 28-foot and the 29-foot barriers. In a word, his jump of 29 feet 2 1/2 inches was ... well, perfect.

But don’t take my word for it. Dick Schaap, the esteemed sportswriter, wrote a book about Beamon’s amazing athletic feat.

It was called “The Perfect Jump.”

Secretariat, 1973

How dominant was “Big Red” in winning the Belmont States en route to capturing horse racing’s triple crown?

Well, put it this way: Secretariat died in 1989. And Sham, Twice a Prince, My Gallant and Private smiles still haven’t caught him.

Those were the only four horses that bothered showing up to run against Secretariat in New York. The rest stayed home to watch Mister Ed reruns on TV. They knew better.

Secretariat won the Belmont by 31 lengths. Or from here to eternity. He was so far in front at the finish that he was the only horse who appeared in the TV shot.

His record in the Belmont (2:24) still stands. I’ll never forget Chic Anderson’s call on TV when he said that Secretariat was moving like a tremendous machine.

They don’t build ‘em like that anymore.

Rocky Marciano, 1952-56

The Brockton Blockbuster held the heavyweight boxing title for five years, during which he never lost a fight. He never lost a fight before becoming champion, either. He never lost a fight, period.

Marciano remains the only heavyweight in boxing history to have retired undefeated. He was 49-0 with 43 coming by the way of very big knockout, as Jimmy Lennon Jr. might put it.

Although it is true the heavyweight division during Marciano’s reign featured more tomato cans than Aisle 3 of the Smith’s Food King, who’s to say he couldn’t have beaten these Russians who rule the division today with one hand tied behind his back?

Not Ezzard Charles. And certainly not Jersey Joe Walcott. Not after The Rock knocked his jaw off its hinges in the 13th round in Philadelphia with “The Greatest Punch in Boxing History.”

Nadia Comaneci, 1976

The Romanian pixie not only revolutionized her sport, she made its scoreboards obsolete.

The scoreboards went to only 9.9 when Comaneci was awarded the first perfect 10 in modern Olympic gymnastics history at the 1976 Games in Montreal. Was it a fluke? An aberration? Was the East German judge as blind as a bat?

I think not. Before those Games were over, Comaneci would earn six more 10s.

If you still can’t get the infernal theme to “The Young and the Restless” out of your head, that would explain it. It was renamed “Nadia’s Theme” after the 1976 Olympics and released as a single, making it to the Top 10.

The question I have is not whether her record will ever be broken, but why Comaneci couldn’t have performed the floor exercise to “Judy in Disguise With Glasses.”

Chinook 2007-?

After more than 500 billion games played over 18 years — take that, McDonald’s — a team of researchers in Calgary, Alberta, announced that its computer program, called Chinook, cannot be beaten in checkers.

If you play the perfect game against Chinook, you will leave with only a draw. That’s like kinging your sister.

In 1990, Chinook qualified to play Marion Tinsley for the world championship of checkers. Tinsley, the checkers master, won four games to two with 33 draws.

In a rematch with Tinsley in 1994, Chinook was declared the winner when Tinsley, who was suffering from pancreatic cancer, withdrew after six draws.

Arsenal, 2003-04

Four years ago, the English Premier League side from North London went the entire regular season — 38 games — without losing.

Not even David Beckham could bend the Gunners’ undefeated season, much less break it.

How hard is it to go an entire English soccer season without losing? Well, the last time it was done before Arsenal was in 1890. Put that in your teacup and sip it.

Jeff Burton, 2000

On Sept. 17, 2000, Jeff Burton roared into the lead in Turn 1 during the Dura Lube 300 at New Hampshire International Speedway. He never gave it up. Not during pit stops. Not when Tony Stewart was in his rearview mirror. Not even when Ricky Bobby ran across the track in his underwear when he thought he was on fire.

Burton was the first driver since Cale Yarborough in 1978 to lead every lap of a NASCAR race.

Jeremy Sonnenfeld, 1997

Bowling and baseball are the two sports in which “perfect game” is part of the vernacular. There have been 18 perfect games — 12 consecutive strikes resulting in a score of 300 — in PBA Tour televised events, and the American Bowling Congress has recognized eight 900 series — three consecutive perfect games.

Since Jeremy Sonnenfeld was the first to do it, he gets the nod here. Sonnenfeld was a member of the University of Nebraska bowling team when he struck 36 times on three different lanes at Sun Valley Lanes in Lincoln on Feb. 2, 1997. It was the first sanctioned 900 series in 101 years — and the only perfect games the state has witnessed since Tom Osborne retired.

Bo Derek, 1979

Since when is looking good a sport? Since 1964, when a model named Babette March was photographed for the cover of Sports Illustrated dressed like Don Schollander. (Think Mark Spitz without the mustache.)

Fifteen years later, a budding 21-year-old trophy wife/actress named Mary Cathleen Collins — Bo Derek for short — put her hair in cornrows, accessorized it with beads and went jogging down the beach in her swimsuit while Blake Edwards got it all on film.

Though beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, I’ll defer to the box cover of the DVD — er, VHS — when it comes to Ms. Derek.

It doesn’t get any more perfect than a “10.”

(Editor's Note: This story has been corrected. An earlier version had that Secretariat has been the only winner of the triple crown.)