For a number of reasons, Indianapolis knocked their Super Bowl host opportunity out of the park. A centralized city with an abundance of hospitable volunteer citizens, coupled with a little help from a friendly Mother Nature, helped Indianapolis to please and surprise almost every one who took part in the week-long festivities. In fact, the NFL has now imposed a rule that every host city must now put together a set-up similar to the Super Bowl village that was built around and through several main streets in downtown Indianapolis.

The bidding process for the 2018 Super Bowl will begin this August. If Indianapolis wishes to put their name in the ring, they must send out a pre-bid this Summer, in order to be considered as a finalist. If selected, then the finalist teams will put together their official bid in 2014, in hopes of hosting the game in 2018. Other cities, such as Minnesota and San Fransisco, have already been considered as being interested in bidding for that same year. Only nine cities in the NFL have been offered the chance to host multiple Super Bowls.

The aftermath of the Super Bowl has left me happy and ready to listen to some music about my hometown, Indianapolis.   To celebrate all the good things that Naptown showed the world in the last week, I present 20 songs I love, with a Hoosier flare:

1. “Indiana Wants Me” … R. Dean Taylor
2. “Small Town” … John Cougar
3. “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” … Tom Petty
4. “Back Home Again In Indiana” … Jim Nabors
5. “Indianapolis” … Menudo
6. “Jim Dean of Indiana” … Phil Ochs
7. “Goin’ Back to Indiana”  … The Jackson Five
8. “Gary Indiana” … Robert Preston
9. “Indiana Jones Theme” … John Williams
10. “On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away” … Paul Dresser
11. “Hail Purdue”
12. “Indiana, Our Indiana”
13. “Indiana” … Andy Mitchell
14. “God Didn’t  Make Little Green Apples” … Roger Miller
15. “Green River” … Waylon Jennings
16. “New Harmony” … Craig Johnson
17. “The Wabash Cannonball” … Roy Acuff
18. “Change the World” … Babyface
19. “November Rain” … Guns N’ Roses
20. “No Rain” … Blind Melon

Feb 4, 2012; Indianapolis, IN, USA; Recording artist O.A.R plays at the Verizon Stage in Super Bowl Village downtown Indianapolis. Mandatory Credit: Andrew Weber-US PRESSWIRE

It’s Super Bowl morning, and you’ll have lots of opportunity to read about the Big Game and all of its pomp and circumstance all over the Internets.   But this is Indianapolis, and this is Naptown’s Finest, so I thought we might do a little something different and point out to the top local links for Colts news and Super Bowl coverage.   Check these often today, and you won’t miss a thing!

• Naptown’s Finest
• The Indianapolis Star
• WRTV-6
• WTHR-13
• WISH-8
• Stampede Blue