NORTH COUNTY -- For a business that deals with sports merchandise, December was the winning streak that saved Christmas.

Assistant manager Manny Lira at Sports Fever in the Westfield North County shopping center in Escondido said Wednesday the entire Christmas season was busy there, and he had customers eager for any merchandise touting the Chargers run to the 2008 AFC division title.

"It's been busy this whole week," Lira said. "On Monday as soon as we opened, we had 15 or 20 people at the door who wanted division stuff. We had probably 30 calls within 45 minutes."

The AFC West title came down to the final game of the regular season, and manufacturers have had little time to create merchandise touting the Chargers victory. The shop was due to get its AFC West champion hats Wednesdays, and shirts are expected to arrive Friday, just in time for the Saturday wild-card playoff game at Qualcomm Stadium against the Indianapolis Colts.

Excitement for the team has been building in the past few weeks, as the resurrected Chargers became the first team to win their division after starting with a 4-8 record.

Chargers season ticket holder Kevin Bonner said he had all but given up on the team before the winning streak.

"I was disgusted," he said about the season's darkest days. "And it ruins everything, too. You don't want to read the paper. You don't want to watch SportsCenter. It makes the week long."

After winning only two games during the opening two months of the season, "improbable" became a much-used word in the sports section. The Chargers winning streak had to coincide with a three-game losing skid by the Broncos for San Diego to win its division on a tiebreaker.

San Diego's streak began with a 34-7 win over the Oakland Raiders on Dec. 4, followed by a come-from-behind 22-21 victory over the Kansas City Chiefs on Dec. 14. The surge to a playoff berth became quite probable Dec. 21, when an impressive 41-24 win over the Tampa Bay Bucaneers preceded a Broncos loss to the Buffalo Bills that same day.

Lira said sales picked up as soon as the team started winning.

"Everybody was down probably 50 percent," he said about all businesses in the mall. "But after the Kansas City game, and then Tampa Bay, our sales went almost through the roof."

Bonner said the winning streak had an emotional effect on fans.

"As soon as they start coming around, you get excited again, and there's a reason to live," he said.

Although he lives in Clairemont, Bonner said he likes to watch Chargers game at Hooligans in Oceanside, a bar owned by his friend, Ricky Bergeron. A favorite hangout of Patriots fans, Bonner suffered through last year's Chargers playoff defeat to New England at the bar.

On Saturday, Bonner said, he plans to be at the stadium to watch the Chargers play the Colts, a team San Diego lost to earlier this year.

Lira, who described himself as a lifelong Chargers fan who sports a lightning bolt tattoo on his bicep, said the season was especially meaningful because the team came back after being written off.

"Nobody thought they were going to win it," he said. "Maybe this is our lucky time. Maybe we're peaking at the right moment."

Despite the exictement of the playoffs, the demand for tickets is not as great as for the Chargers game against Denver, said Vincent Campise, president of Empire tickets in San Diego. As of Thursday afternoon, tickets were available for the playoff game through Ticketmaster.

"Basically, it was $300 to get in the door for last week's game," he said. "This week, there's a big, big supply, which means prices are only $100 and up. It's a classic example of supply and demand."

Contact staff writer Gary Warth at (760) 740-5410 or gwarth@nctimes.com.