If this year's Super Bowl was a nail-biter for New York Giants fans, if was even more so for the handful of advertisers who ran ads in the fourth quarter. They were betting $2.7 million against history that the game would be close and their ads in those final minutes would be seen by huge numbers of viewers.

They got it right, for sure, when the Giants kept the game close all the way into the fourth quarter and then pulled off a last-minute touchdown against the undefeated New England Patriots to win the game.

Airing on Fox on Feb. 3, it was the most-watched Super Bowl in history--just under 98 million people tuned in--and those final minutes saw even higher viewership; 49 percent of homes were watching the last 22 minutes.

But the payout to advertisers went beyond that. Their ads got even higher veiwership than the three-hour game averaged.

They became among the most-watched commercials in history, surpassing those of all past Super Bowls and even such major TV events as the 1983 "M*A*S*H" finale.

A commercial pod airing in those final minutes generated a 47.9 household rating, delivering huge audiences for advertisers Victoria’s Secret, Amp energy drink and a promotional spot for Fox’s "American Idol."

The Victoria’s Secret commercial was seen by 103.8 million people, ranking No. 1 among all spots, according to Nielsen’s analysis of its ratings. Amp was close behind with 103.6 million people watching.

"Certainly, on average at least, this is among the most-watched programs ever, so these are among the most-watched commercials ever," says Steve Sternberg, executive vice president of audience analysis at Magna Global, which released a report on the game that analyzes minute by minute ratings.

But while commercials airing late in the game were the most watched on the Super Bowl, the matchup between the Giants and Patriots delivered big for all advertisers.

Virtually every commercial break generated higher ratings than the few minutes of the game that preceded it, on average 1 percent higher.

For example, the first few minutes of the Super Bowl averaged a 37.4 household rating but a commercial pod with spots from Bud Light and Audi that followed had a 38.6 rating. In third quarter, a commercial pod with Cars.com, Salesgenie.com and Vitamin Water averaged a 43.3 rating, compared to 42.9 for the six minutes of the game that led into it.

"That’s pretty significant and vastly different from what you see in most primetime programs," notes Sternberg. Typically, commercials on primetime shows lose more than 5 percent of a program’s rating.

And as it turns out, most commercials also got a decent bump in viewing in DVR playback, according to Nielsen.

Highest among these was a spot for the Disney movie "Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian," which was watched by an additional 4.2 million people in DVR playback the same day of the game.