Kansas City’s Success on Super Bowl Sunday

The Kansas City Chiefs beat the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LVII on Sunday, by a score of 38-35. The game had a lot of back-and-forth action, with the Eagles leading by the end of the first half. The Chiefs came back to tie in the second half, where they eventually won the game with a field goal. 

Patrick Mahomes, who eventually was named MVP, threw for 182 yards, and 3 touchdowns while leading his team to a second half comeback. He battled through a reaggravated high ankle sprain during the second half of the game. Despite this injury, he still managed to run for 44 yards and be the spark Kansas City needed. The Chiefs played a strong game and performed well both offensively and defensively. 

For the Eagles, Jalen Hurts threw for 304 yards and 1 touchdown. While this seems low for throwing over 300 yards, he did score the other 3 touchdowns for the team. The Eagles were off to a really good start, scoring pretty consistently and locking down the Chiefs on defense. This helped them get ahead of the Chiefs by 10 points by the end of the first half. However, during the second half, the Chiefs found holes in Philadelphia’s defense and took advantage of that. The momentum favored Kansas City when they forced a second quarter fumble that led to a touchdown by Nick Bolton.

A game-changing moment was Eagles cornerback James Bradberry’s controversial holding penalty on Juju Smith-Schuster. This play happened late in the 4th quarter on a critical third down, where Bradberry was flagged for holding Juju which allowed the Chiefs to get 4 new downs. If this penalty hadn’t been called, Jalen Hurts would’ve been given a chance to win the game with around 1:44 left on the clock. Instead, the Eagles were left with 6 seconds, where Jalen Hurts threw an errant hail mary pass to end the game.

The Chiefs offense was electric the whole game, and it felt as if every time they were on offense they were in prime position to score. Their defense was their biggest flaw in the first half, as they allowed the Eagles offense to absolutely dominate time of possession. Because of this, Patrick Mahomes was mostly kept off the field as the Eagles offense kept rolling. However, this would not be the case in the second half, as Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs defense stormed back into the game, creating big plays on both sides of the ball. Kansas City outscored Philly 24-11 in the second half, allowing for them to win the Super Bowl.