IMO one of the reasons is that the goals are so important. It's one of the lowest scoring sports, if not the lowest.
In sports like basketball and rugby, the points come thick and fast, so it's not really special when your team scores, where as in football you go absolutely nuts when they score a goal. Not only that, football is exciting and tense from start to finish. In bball, you just need to tune into the last 5 minutes and you can go to school and talk to your friends about the game as if you watched the whole thing. Not the case in football...
Michael Jordan could stay in the air for 5 seconds, stop for a tea break, spin around 3 times and dunk it...from the free throw line... but it'll still be worth the same measly number of points.