NEW ORLEANS — After a quiet five games, Joe Horn suddenly looked like the star player he was in 2004, with his shoulder-shaking end zone dances and game-changing catches.

He wasn't the only one dancing.

A packed crowd in the Louisiana Superdome watched the revamped New Orleans Saints pull out a legitimizing victory over one of most feared teams in the NFL. Kept out of the end zone until yesterday, Horn caught touchdown passes of 14 and 48 yards, then John Carney hit a 31-yard field goal as time expired for a 27-24 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles.

"I've got to keep doing a better job of getting him involved early on," Saints first-year coach Sean Payton said of his veteran receiver, who finished with six catches for 110 yards. "He plays hard and has been fantastic. He is everything you want in a player. If he has two catches and we win he is happy. ... I admire that about him."

New Orleans (5-1) enters its bye week atop the NFC South. If anyone still doubts the surprising start of a team that went 3-13 last season, the Eagles (4-2), favored on the road coming in, can't be counted among the critics.

"It's a whole different team," said Eagles defensive end Darren Howard, who played for New Orleans last season. "They're doing it with a young set of guys who don't remember what happened in years past. ... It's six games and they]re 5-1. It's hard to say anything but they're legitimate."

GIANTS 27, FALCONS 14

ATLANTA — Tiki Barber showed the Atlanta Falcons a thing or two about running the football.

Barber outplayed the NFL's best ground team by running for 185 yards, Jeremy Shockey caught a couple of touchdown passes and New York rallied past Atlanta in the second half.

The Giants (3-2) fell behind 14-3 when Warrick Dunn broke off a 90-yard touchdown on Atlanta's first offensive play of the second half — the longest run in team history. But New York dominated the Falcons (3-2) the rest of the way, going ahead with touchdown drives of 84 and 91 yards.

SEAHAWKS 30, RAMS 28

ST. LOUIS — Josh Brown's 54-yard field goal as time expired helped Seattle regain first place from its NFC West rival.

The winning kick came after a 5-yard penalty that briefly had the Rams (4-2) thinking they'd pulled off another improbable win.

What happened was a simple illegal formation penalty against the Seahawks (4-1) as they spiked the ball to give Brown a chance for the long field goal.

The Rams began to celebrate, believing a 10-second clock runoff would give them the win. But officials ruled that because the ball had been spotted and snapped properly, there was no runoff.