This is no joke, the Saints are playing for the playoffs.

It doesn’t matter the record, just the final outcome.

To that end, the Saints find themselves in control of their own destiny.

Two wins over the final two weeks would mean a division title and home playoff game. They are not concerned with how they got here, but rather what they do now that they have arrived.

“This is what you hope for before the season starts, to be playing for something significant at the end,” said quarterback Drew Brees.

For the Saints, this game is personal.

Back in the opening week of the season, when they were expected to make a long run toward the Super Bowl, the Saints blew a late lead in Atlanta.

The overtime loss to the Falcons provided a glimpse of just what a roller-coaster ride this season would be. It hasn’t changed since.

Yet with two games left, the Saints and Falcons are playing for their postseason lives.

A Saints win will end the Falcons’ hopes of winning the NFC South. An Atlanta win and it will be a 3-team sprint to the finish in the final week, with the Carolina Panthers in the running.

But with the first game so long ago, there isn’t much to take from it, or is there?

“Two totally different teams,” said Brees.

Still, it is two teams that have had success in recent years now just trying to claw their way into the playoffs.

“You try not to make it bigger than it is,” said Brees. “What we want to do is re-establish ourselves at home.”

That has been a problem this season. The Saints have lost their last four games inside the Superdome.

However, now is when it matters as the only thing they have to worry about is winning.

“You look at scenarios when you don’t control your own destiny,” Brees said. “You don’t when you control it. Right now we control our own destiny.”

Hard to believe at 6-8, but it is true.

Then again, so do the Falcons. Even at 5-9 Atlanta will win the division itself with two straight victories. They play Carolina in the season finale while the Saints will travel to Tampa Bay.

The Saints know they must be prepared for something new when they play the Falcons this time around.

“They are an explosive team offensively,” said head coach Sean Payton. “They are a team that starts fast.”

Led by quarterback Matt Ryan, Atlanta can put up numbers on any defense but has also had some late-game miscues that have proven costly.

New Orleans will counter Ryan with a new-look secondary, which picked off three passes last Monday night in Chicago.

“This is not just a challenge for the secondary, it is a challenge for the entire defense,” said Payton.

This entire season has been a challenge for the entire club, so what’s another one this weekend anyway.(Associated Press)

Charles Rex Arbogast