No, it wasn’t the Super Bowl. Or the conference championship game. Or a postseason game of any kind.

It just seemed that way.

In fact, last night’s Patriots-Giants game probably received more pregame television hype than we’ll see from now until Feb. 3, when Super Bowl XLII is played in Arizona. The NFL Network began its pregame show at 2 p.m. — 6 hours and 15 minutes before kickoff. Local television stations jumped in, starting at 7 p.m. And when the game was played, it was available on two of the four major broadcast networks in addition to the NFL Network.

“It’s like the [president’s] State of the Union [address],” Pats coach Bill Belichick joked last week. “It’s on every channel.”

The reason is that the Patriots have become the new America’s Team. Some hate them, some love them, but everybody watches them. They’ve been smashing records for TV ratings this season, and last night — when they were trying to become only the fourth team in the history of the National Football League to finish undefeated in the regular season — it seemed the whole world was watching. Or at least the whole country.

But that’s nothing new. Consider:

• The Patriots-Ravens game on ESPN’s Monday Night Football on Dec. 3 was the most-watched cable program in television history, attracting 17,522,000 viewers.

• The 33.8-million people who watched the Pats and the Colts on CBS on Sunday afternoon, Nov. 4, was the largest audience ever for a Sunday afternoon regular-season NFL game.

• That game was also the highest-rated program of any kind in the 2007-08 television season, drawing a 22.5 rating.

• The second- and third-highest-rated programs of the year were also Patriots games. They had an 18.5 rating for their game against the Steelers on Dec. 9, and an 18.0 rating for their game against the Cowboys on Oct. 14.

That’s nationally. Locally, the numbers are even more staggering.

The Dec. 16 game with the Jets had a 40.4 rating in the Boston market, the highest-rated 1 p.m. Patriots game in history. The only game that topped it for an overall rating was a 4:15 p.m. game against the Dolphins on Dec. 7, 2003, which had a 43.8 rating. That game was played in the middle of a snowstorm.

Overall, the Pats are averaging a 32.1 rating for their games this season, the highest number they’ve had. Since postseason ratings generally increase by approximately 15 to 20 points, the Pats may approach ratings in the 50s during the playoffs.

Which makes it understandable why yesterday was all Patriots all the time on television.

amartone@projo.com