The cold winter months bring more than cozy sweaters, warm drinks, and holidays. It also brings out controversy, emotions, and passions between people — three words that can summarize the 2021/22 NFL playoffs this season. The quarterbacks (QB) on each playoff team have been superb and have led to some of the most heart-palpitating plays. Tom Brady announcing his retirement after the Tampa Bay Buccaneers lost has been one of the lower-tier highlights of the postseason. The real story has been the Cinderella story unfolding in front of our eyes as the Cincinnati Bengals, the team everyone had coined to choke against the American Football Conference (AFC) favorites, won those games and are playing in the Super Bowl this Sunday, Feb. 13.
Joe Burrow’s performance and leadership as the Bengals’ passionate and heartthrob QB has led to intelligent playmaking decisions that have kept the underdog team level-headed, even when playing against high-caliber teams. The Bengals’ other weapons include rookie wide-receiver Ja’Marr Chase, whose rendition of the “Griddy” dance has become a delight to watch after each touchdown. Chase gained 1,455 receiving yards this season, breaking the first-year rookie receiving record. The dynamic of the Burrow to Chase connection is nothing short of mystical, and they hold a spot among the top five most completed touchdown passes between a quarterback and receiver in their first season together. The final ace up Cincinnati’s sleeve is their kicker Evan McPherson. The star kicker has come in clutch these playoffs, kicking the game-winning field goals against the Tennessee Titans and Kansas City Chiefs that have seen the Bengals to the playoffs.
Sunday marks the third Super Bowl appearance for the Cinderella Bengals, who played in the big game twice in the 1980’s. Their last appearance was in 1988 against the San Francisco 49ers, where they lost by one scoring chance. A win this Sunday would be the club’s first moment to wear the laurels and hoist the Vince Lombardi Trophy, and the title of World Champions.
The Bengals’ playoff run has been one of the sports fables of yore. The team best known for being the underdog of underdogs gets a perfect circumstance, the right players, the right attitude, and heart to come together for an amazing run for glory — rekindling the love for the game for the month of romance, and a run that the late icon, coach John Madden, would enthusiastically enjoy.
The Cincinnati Bengals had a tough road to get in the Super “Ball.” Three wicked challenges stood in their way — starting with the favored Tennessee Titans in the Divisional Playoffs and the Kansas City Chiefs in the Conference finals. Kansas City took a large 18 point lead at the end of the first half; however, the Bengals’ defense managed to stop the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes from scoring more than three points in the entire second half. This bought the Bengals enough time and possessions to make the epic comeback that the underdogs needed to give Evan McPherson the chance to make another clutch field goal, giving all football fans the ability to watch this fairytale play out to the end.
The third wicked challenge dwelled in the National Football Conference. Luckily, the Bengals will not have to face the San Francisco 49ers on any given Sunday in the NFC finals. The Rams return to the Super Bowl, a glamorous ball and event that the Los Angeles team is no stranger to. Feb. 13 marks the Rams’ fifth Super Bowl game. They have made it to the championship twice in the last four years, but have only won the championship once, in 1999. The NFC team is no pushover either. The football club made smart and key trades throughout the 2021 season to build their Super Bowl contending roster. This will cost the L.A. team lower draft picks for the next few seasons, as well as building an expensive roster to keep a hold on with the salary cap.
With the Rams’ great office management and acquisitions, and the Bengals’ phenomenal season, this final showdown should give a fair ending for teams that took drastically different approaches to go the distance.
Teryn Midzain is an English Major with ambitious goals to write movies and a full-time nerd, whose personality and eccentrics run on high-octane like the cars he loves. More importantly, Teryn loves sports [Formula One], and doesn’t care who knows. When not creating and running deadly schemes in his D&D sessions, Teryn tries to reach the core of what makes the romantic and dramatic World of Sports, the characters and people that make the events so spectacular.
