Keyed by two boffo debate performances where he brought the crowd to its feet, Newt Gingrich easily won the South Carolina Republican Primary for President, smacking GOP front runner Mitt Romney and insuring that this race won't be decided before Super Tuesday in March.
The best way to show how big of a win Gingrich had is to look at the map of the Palmetto State, as Gingrich won 43 of the 46 counties in South Carolina:
Romney won only in Richland County (home to the state capital of Columbia), Charleston County (Charleston) and Beaufort County (home to Hilton Head.)
When the week began, the news narrative in South Carolina was that Mitt Romney might be the presumptive GOP nominee after a win, giving him victories in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.
But things started to change on Thursday when Iowa was officially awarded to Rick Santorum and the polls began to move towards Gingrich.
Early in the week, one poll gave Romney at 12 point edge on Gingrich.
Gingrich ended up winning by more than 13 percentage points, as he steamrolled Romney in key conservative groups like Tea Party supporters and evangelicals.
Now it's off to Florida, where Romney has been ahead in the polls.
But could he face the same evaporation of support there as well?
Romney signaled in his concession speech that he would go after Gingrich on several fronts - look for ethics to be one of them.
But will it work?
Gingrich has clearly tapped into a vein of Republican concern about Romney, a feeling that the GOP Establishment is trying to push Romney on them.
Romney should have the advantage, but sometimes money can't stop momentum.
Florida votes on January 31; we'll have two debates again this coming week, with one in Tampa on Monday and another in Jacksonville on Thursday.
Joining Romney and Gingrich in the Sunshine State will be Rick Santorum and Ron Paul, both of whom finished far behind Gingrich.
Santorum just never caught on in South Carolina and didn't come close to Gingrich in key counties upstate around Spartanburg and Greenville.
Paul did much better than four years ago, but didn't come close to winning any counties or delegates. He now hopes to do better in some of the caucus states in February.
One week ago, we wondered if this race would last past Florida - now we seem assured of getting to Super Tuesday in March, and maybe beyond.
