Super Bowl LV Recap

Sunday, February 7, 2021, brought an end to the unprecedented and somewhat unlikely 2020 NFL season. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers routed the Kansas City Chiefs 31-9 in the Super Bowl. Tom Brady, the Bucs’ Quarterback, won his 7th ring and joined now-Hall of Famer Peyton Manning as the second QB in history to win a Super Bowl with two different teams. This victory gives Tom Brady more Super Bowl wins as an individual than any franchise in the NFL, superseding the New England Patriots and the Pittsburgh Steelers, each of which has won six Super Bowl titles. The Bucs played very well on Sunday and clearly had a great game plan. The Chiefs were disappointing, to say the least, appearing undisciplined and unmotivated. This loss will likely always be a topic of conversation regarding the franchise and their star QB, Patrick Mahomes. 

The Bucs came out completely prepared for the seemingly unstoppable Chiefs’ offense. Tampa Bay was able to exploit the Chiefs’ depleted offensive line and apply consistent and intense pressure to Patrick Mahomes. In addition to the pass rush, the Bucs made excellent use of two high-safety defense, which places both safeties in deep zone coverage, to defuse the explosiveness of the Chiefs’ star receiver, Tyreek Hill. The Bucs’ defense limited the Chiefs to only nine points, coming from three field goals. They also picked off Mahomes twice, neither time in a game-changing manner, and held him to zero touchdowns. For context, Mahomes hasn’t finished a game with zero touchdowns as a starter since 2019. In contrast, the Bucs’ offense was dominant and efficient. Tom Brady won his fifth Super Bowl MVP title, going 21 for 29  passing, with three touchdowns. When they weren’t passing, the Bucs demonstrated an ability to run all over the Chiefs, with Leonard Fournette gaining 89 yards and a touchdown in 16 carries. Rob Gronkowski, who formerly played with Brady for nine years on the Patriots, was a key asset to the Bucs’ offense. Gronkowski retired from the NFL before the 2019 season but decided to return this year to play with his old friend Brady in Tampa. He spent most of the year in the background, as the Bucs’ offense already boasts Mike Evans and Chris Godwin as primary targets. On Sunday, Brady and Gronk gave a vintage performance, with Gronk catching two touchdown passes. 

Tampa Bay played very well, but the result of this Super Bowl came down more to the Chiefs’ failures, in my opinion. Had the Chiefs played to their potential, this would have been a very different game. The Chiefs’ defense was decent at first, but the number of penalties they amassed was unbelievable. In the second quarter, it seemed like every single snap had a defensive penalty against the Chiefs. To name a few instances, Tyrann Mathieu made a crucial interception that was negated by a holding call. The Chiefs forced an incompletion in the end zone on a 3rd down that was negated by a pass interference call, Chiefs defensive tackle Chris Jones gave a Bucs lineman a little shove after a play and got an unsportsmanlike conduct call. Overall, the Chiefs incurred 11 penalties for a loss of 120 yards throughout the game. Besides the penalties, the Chiefs defense just couldn’t hold the Bucs most of the time. The Bucs only gave up four turnovers, with one on downs and three punts, two of which were late in the fourth quarter, when the game was already decided. Meanwhile, the Chiefs had seven turnovers either on downs, by punt, or by a pick. The one good thing the defense did was execute an incredible goal-line stand in the second quarter. This moment looked like a shift in momentum to the Chiefs. They were only down 7-3, and they managed to get the ball out of their own endzone. Unfortunately, dropped also hindered the Chiefs all game. Earlier, on the Chiefs’ first drive, Tyreek Hill had failed to catch a pass that hit him directly in the face in the endzone. Similarly, on this post-goal-line stand drive, tight end Travis Kelce dropped a pass that hit him in the hands on 3rd and 8 and forced the Chiefs to punt from their own territory. This punt also went poorly for the Chiefs. The punter dropped the snap but managed to recover the ball only for the Chiefs’ position to be––you guessed it––called back due to a neutral zone infraction penalty. When re-punting the ball, the punter shanked it and gave the Bucs excellent field position which they capitalized on with a touchdown that put them up 14-3 and began the slaughter. 

For the rest of the game, the Chief’s offense was hapless and lethargic. They had some good drives only for them to end in field goals, while the Bucs continued to rain touchdowns on the other side. Towards the end of the game, Patrick Mahomes was making plays that defied the laws of physics, only for his receivers to drop the passes. In what has been named the greatest incompletion ever, Mahomes threw the ball while flying parallel to the ground after scrambling away from pressure. He maintained enough accuracy to hit his receiver in the face in the end zone, only for the ball to be dropped. The fact that Mahomes was put in this futile position highlighted another major issue for the Chiefs. The Chiefs’ offensive line was missing both starting tackles, and it showed. Mahomes was pressured on 52% of his dropbacks, the most in Super Bowl history. He ran for over 400 yards before throwing the ball or being sacked, the most of any QB this season. Despite this continual pressure, Patrick Mahomes still looked very good. His stat line might say otherwise, but he made incredible throws in a terrible situation and received no help.

I also can’t help but mention the officiating of this game. There was never any doubt in my mind that the Bucs were going to win the game, but some of the Chiefs’ 11 penalties were egregiously poor calls. The holding call that negated Mathieu’s interception was ridiculous. The hold that got called was nowhere near the ball and wouldn’t be called four out of five times in any other game. The pass interference call in the end zone was questionable as well because the ball was uncatchable, and there really wasn’t clear interference. The called back punt was also questionable, but the officials moved past it too quickly to really tell if the Chiefs player lined up offsides. The refs didn’t win the game for the Bucs, but they were certainly much too involved. 

This victory has likely cemented Tom Brady as the greatest football player ever, with seven Super Bowls across 2 teams, and a myriad of other records. This game may have also snuffed out what looked like an emerging dynasty in Kansas City. I hope Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs recover, but we’ve seen Russel Wilson, a young star quarterback, lose to Tom Brady in his second Super Bowl and never make it back. As always, the worst part of this Super Bowl is that we now have to wait until September to watch football again.