Dre Kirkpatrick, the son of a preacher man who fathered one of the greatest moments in Paycor Stadium history, salutes the congregation Sunday when he returns as Ruler of the Jungle.

It's 11 years to the week his pick-six of Peyton Manning put the Bengals into the 2014 playoffs, and that near Monday night religious experience of the 37-28 victory over Denver before 66,107 believers gave the injury-riddled Bengals redemption and Kirkpatrick a forever home.

"I remember that night very, very, very, well," Kirkpatrick recalls during another holiday week. "That was the night that lit the fire of defining of who I was as a Bengal. It gave me an identity in the city of Cincinnati. For me, that probably was the highlight of my career."

For the Bengals, it was one of the two biggest pick-sixes of a Hall of Fame quarterback in their history. It has to be mentioned in the same see-your-breath as Louis Breeden's 102-yard coast-to-coaster off Dan Fouts in San Diego that helped put the 1981 AFC title game in Cincinnati disguised as the Freezer Bowl.

It also gave that '14 team a remarkable 10th win despite:

• Losing coordinators Mike Zimmer and Jay Gruden in the previous offseason.
• Two of their top offensive weapons, 10-touchdown wide receiver Marvin Jones and dangerous tight end Tyler Eifert, played a combined eight snaps all year.
• Pro Bowl wide receiver A.J. Green missed three games and major parts of two others, including the second half of the night Dr. Dre surgically removed all doubt and put head coach Marvin Lewis' Bengals into the playoffs for a fourth straight year.

For the 6-2 lean and leathery Kirkpatrick, it settled him down on and off the field. He came into that night with fewer than 200 snaps under his belt that season, a former first-rounder in his third year still trying to break into a cornerback room stacked with first-round veterans Leon Hall, Adam "Pacman," Jones and Terence Newman. Rookie first-rounder Darqueze Dennard even waited behind Kirkpatrick.

After Kirkpatrick stunned Manning on the 30-yard pick six with 2:41 left in the game to expand the 30-28 lead as the rain turned into swirling flurries, he preserved it just a minute and a half later with a full-out extension interception at the Bengals 5 while somehow keeping his feet in before spilling out of bounds.

"I'm thinking, 'They've got to play me now,'" says Kirkpatrick with his signature cackle.

It's a sequence that didn't seem to make it into Peyton's Places when Manning returned to shoot a few scenes this summer.

"I think he buried them," Kirkpatrick says.

Kirkpatrick started ever since, including the next week in the AFC North title game that the Steelers won in Pittsburgh, and the week after that in the Colts' Wild Card win in Indianapolis, and through the rest of his eight seasons with the Bengals.

(An asterisk: The next year, the Giants came to Paycor to participate in a joint practice to start the preseason, and in a drill Kirkpatrick picked Eli Manning throwing to Odell Beckham Jr. He made it official in 2016 when he picked Eli in New York in a regular-season game.

"That's got to be a rarity," says Kirkpatrick of picking both Mannings.

Not really, says Elias. More than 30 players have got them both.)

When Kirkpatrick retired after one-year stints in Arizona and San Francisco in 2021, the Alabama native who helped lead the Crimson Tide to two national championships put down roots on the eastern fringe of Cincinnati.

"I've never left," says Kirkpatrick. "I'm from a small town back home in Alabama. Not a lot going on. Going from Gadsden to Tuscaloosa, from Tuscaloosa to Cincinnati, Cincinnati was the biggest city I ever lived in.

"I made so many friends here. I was here for eight years. It just didn't make any sense for me to just up and leave, no matter if I was playing for another team or not. I have my family here, and I see the potential and the opportunity to be a businessman here as well. Once I looked at all of the things that was put in front of me, it was just the perfect fit."

Just like he was that on that Monday night when he surfaced in the second half, and analyst Jon Gruden told play-by-play man Mike Tirico on the national telecast that Manning had to go after "Kirkpatrick, the young cornerback."

Kirkpatrick played just 22 snaps that night, and that's only because his position coach, Vance Joseph, won a second-half debate on the sidelines: "If Dre can't play, I can't coach, and I know I can coach. Put him in the bleeping game."

They did. Kirkpatrick remembers safety Reggie Nelson at first griped about "the young boy being in there." But he settled himself down and Kirkpatrick at the same time with words about how they were communicating out there as only a vet safety could offer on an AFC North tested defense that was ranked 12th in points allowed.

"Reggie was getting interceptions, and we just had a lot of ball hogs that knew the game. that understood the game," Kirkpatrick says. "We had a lot of veteran guys that knew the game, that understood the game. We just weren't out there playing football. We were actually playing the game, We playing within the defense. And I think that's what separated us, and that's why our numbers showed that guys had a hard time against us."

That night, Manning had been exploiting Newman deep as he worked against Demaryius Thomas, the gifted Denver wide receiver. Joseph instructed Kirkpatrick to keep outside leverage on his side. On the pick-six, Kirkpatrick leveraged Thomas into middle linebacker Vontaze Burfict, and Manning floated it to Kirkpatrick outside.

"They put Demaryius on me. I automatically knew. I said. 'It's a fact check. They're coming right here with this ball.' And they ran the Wilt route," Kirkpatrick says.

"It's a fake slant where he pivots and goes back out. And by me playing cover three and outside leverage, he just ran right back into me."

It was a timing route, Kirkpatrick says, and after Newman had been playing Thomas head-up and squared all game, Manning was caught by surprise that Kirkpatrick had taken away the fade.

"Oh my God. Electric. That's the loudest I ever heard the Bengals' stadium in my time there," Kirkpatrick says.

When Manning sent Thomas at him again about 90 seconds later, Kirkpatrick thought it was a similar route. Except that he thought they tried to extend it into some type of post corner. Kirkpatrick kept running to the outside leverage and beat the ball and Thomas.

"He was trying to sell the post underneath me to cut back out," Kirkpatrick says. " I think he was throwing into a spot and my being on Demaryius' lower outside, he couldn't get back fast enough."

Which makes this Sunday all that more special.

Not long after, Kirkpatrick was in a club in Atlanta and was called over to a table by Thomas' cousin. Demaryius was there, and there was some good-natured kidding about the picks. At the end of the night, they exchanged numbers and became close friends.

When Thomas died four years ago of a seizure after grappling with memory issues following his career and a 2019 car accident, Kirkpatrick says, "It was one of the worst things I ever heard."

Kirkpatrick went to work and last month opened Memories Lounge on Seventh Street in downtown Cincinnati that's dedicated to Thomas.

"It's in my mission statement," Kirkpatrick says. "He was one of my closest friends. A lot of us athletes deal with memory loss and mental health issues, and I just want to shed that light on it."

Kirkpatrick has other investments, such as 50 acres in Alabama, where he's developing 300 townhomes. But there's no question where the deed is to his heart. He'll be ruling it on Sunday.

"Everything is timing," says Kirkpatrick of Peyton, Demaryius and the routes of a lifetime.