Super Bowl LIV in Miami marks the end of the NFL’s 100th season. The game between the NFC Champion San Francisco 49ers and the AFC Champion Kansas City Chiefs will air from Hard Rock Stadium on FOX, with kickoff slated for 6:30 p.m. EST.
Including the postseason, 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo (23-5, .821) and Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes (27-8, .771) have a combined career winning percentage of .794, the highest combined winning percentage among opposing starting Super Bowl quarterbacks with a minimum of 25 career starts.
Here’s what’s at stake in Super Bowl LIV:
With a San Francisco victory…
With a Kansas City win…
The 49ers, who were 4-12 in 2018, became the third team to advance to a Super Bowl after winning four-or-fewer games the prior season, joining the 1999 St. Louis Rams (4-12 in 1998) and the 1988 Cincinnati Bengals (4-11 in 1987).
San Francisco advanced to Miami with a 37-20 win over Green Bay in the NFC Championship. Raheem Mostert rushed for 220 yards, the second-most rushing yards in an NFL postseason game, behind Eric Dickerson’s 248 rushing yards for the Los Angeles Rams on Jan. 4, 1986. Mostert also became the third running back in postseason history to rush for at least four touchdowns in a game, joining Ricky Watters (five) and LeGarrette Blount (four).
Jimmy Garoppolo has a 23-5 (.821) career record as a starter, including the postseason, and makes his first-career Super Bowl start.
George Kittle has 2,945 career receiving yards and surpassed Mike Ditka (2,774) for the most receiving yards by a tight end in his first three seasons. Emmanuel Sanders joined Walter Payton, LaDainian Tomlinson and Odell Beckham Jr., as the only non-quarterbacks to record both a passing and receiving touchdown in multiple games since 1970. Deebo Samuel had three games with at least 100 receiving yards in 2019, the most by a rookie in franchise history.
Rookie Nick Bosa recorded three sacks in the 49ers’ first two postseason games in 2019 and can become the third rookie since 1982 to record at least four sacks in a single postseason, joining Greg Townsend (4.5 sacks in 1983) and Garin Veris (four in 1985). Arik Armstead recorded a sack in each of San Francisco’s two postseason games this year. Richard Sherman registered an interception in both the Divisional and Championship rounds. Dee Ford, who spent five seasons (2014-18) with Kansas City, recorded a career-high 13 sacks and seven forced fumbles with the 49ers in 2018.
Kansas City won the AFC Championship with a 35-24 win over the Tennessee Titans. Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs back from a 10-0 deficit, taking the lead with a 27-yard touchdown run before halftime. He also threw for 294 yards and three touchdowns. Sammy Watkins caught seven passes for 114 yards, including a 60-yard touchdown. The Chiefs won the AFC West (12-4) for a fourth consecutive year, the longest streak in franchise history.
The Chiefs have scored at least 30 points in each of Mahomes’ first four career postseason starts, tied for the second-longest streak in the Super Bowl era. At 24 years and 138 days, he is the fifth-youngest quarterback to start a Super Bowl. With a victory, Mahomes would become the youngest player to win both an NFL MVP award and a Super Bowl championship, surpassing Emmitt Smith, who was 24 years, 233 days old on the last day of his MVP 1993 season. Mahomes recorded 75 touchdown passes and 9,238 passing yards in his first 30 career games, both the most by any player through 30 career games in NFL history.
Damien Williams has four touchdowns this postseason, including three in the Divisional Round. Williams has nine total touchdowns in his first five postseason games, tied with Terrell Davis (nine) and Larry Fitzgerald (nine) for the most by a player in his first five postseason games in NFL history. Tyreek Hill has 21 career touchdowns of at least 40 yards, tied with Jerry Rice (21) for the third-most in a player’s first four seasons. Travis Kelce became the first tight end in NFL history with four consecutive 1,000-yard receiving seasons. Since 2017, Hill and Kelce have combined for 7,795 receiving yards, the most by a wide receiver-tight end tandem over a three-season span since 1970.