NEW ORLEANS — Star quarterback Patrick Mahomes, trusty tight end Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs are pursuing NFL history, along with a few of Taylor Swift’s records.
Running back Saquon Barkley, quarterback Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles stand in their way.
The AFC champion Chiefs (17-2) will try to become the first team to win three straight Super Bowls when they face the NFC-best Eagles (17-3) at the Superdome on Sunday. The 59th edition of the NFL’s big game is set for 6:30 p.m. Eastern, with Fox televising the game and Tubi offering a free streaming option with registration.
Super Bowl LIX is a rematch from two years ago, when Hurts nearly led the Eagles to a championship only to watch Mahomes snatch it away by rallying Kansas City to a 38-35 win on Harrison Butker’s 27-yard field goal with eight seconds left.
Mahomes lifted the Chiefs to an overtime win against the San Francisco 49ers in another Super Bowl rematch last year. Now they’re poised for a three-peat — a word coach Andy Reid doesn’t use much.
“I think the only time I’ve heard him say it is to the media whenever y’all ask him about it,” Mahomes said. “He’s very locked in on just: ‘How can we be great with our cadence today at practice?’ So that’s just the stuff that Coach Reid focuses on.”
Reid won more games than any coach in franchise history during his 14 seasons in Philadelphia but couldn’t win the big one, going 1-4 in NFC championship games and losing a Super Bowl to the dynastic New England Patriots. He went straight to Kansas City when the Eagles fired him after the 2012 season and has built a dynasty based at Arrowhead Stadium, thanks to Mahomes, Kelce, defensive tackle Chris Jones and other players who have the Chiefs in the Super Bowl for the fifth time in six seasons and seeking their fourth title in that span (as well as the franchise’s fifth overall in seven appearances).
“You don’t have time to think about all that,” Reid said of the three-peat. “You’re focused in on the job at hand here, and that’s playing against a great Eagles team.”
Jones, an All-Pro first-team selection for the third consecutive season, echoed his coach’s viewpoint.
“We don’t talk about no three-peat,” Jones said. “I think that’s what we’re here for. We understand that. We understand there’s one more game until the offseason and we can do whatever we want to do. Our main focus is making sure we’re prepared for the Eagles.”
No matter what the Chiefs say, everyone else is talking about it. No team has done it in the Super Bowl era, though the Green Bay Packers won an NFL championship in 1965 and followed by winning the first two editions of what would be retroactively referred to as the Super Bowl. Kelce even started all the three-peat talk on stage last year when he said the team’s goal was to win a third title in a row.
“This is going to be our biggest test yet,” Kelce said of the Eagles, making the franchise’s fifth Super Bowl appearance and seeking a second victory in the big game. “They’ve got a lot of great players, but the biggest thing is they play great together. You could see their communication. You could see the accountability they have, especially in the secondary. It’s not going make my job any easier.”
These Eagles are different from the group that fell just short against Kansas City two years ago at Super Bowl LVII.
For one thing, they have the NFL’s most dynamic player in the backfield. Barkley rushed for 2,447 yards with seven touchdowns of 60-plus yards in the regular season and playoffs.
“The goal has always been to win it, not just to get here,” said Barkley, who has thrived in his first year with Philadelphia after six largely disappointing seasons with the NFC East rival New York Giants to begin his pro career.
Losing to the Chiefs two years ago only motivated Hurts even more. He’s determined to hoist a Lombardi Trophy and even had a photo of him walking off the field with Kansas City’s red-and-yellow confetti falling around him in 2023 as the background on his phone.
“It’s had a great driving force,” Hurts said of that loss. “It lit a flame, lit a fire in me, and to have this opportunity again is exactly what you work for.”
Hurts, Barkley, receivers A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith and a dominant offensive line present a major challenge for Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo.
The Eagles also have the NFL’s top-ranked defense this season, featuring eight new starters compared to 2022 and with veteran coordinator Vic Fangio added in the most recent offseason. All-Pro linebacker Zack Baun and rookie cornerbacks Cooper DeJean and Quinyon Mitchell plus the emergence of tackle Jalen Carter and edge rusher Nolan Smith have transformed a unit that fell apart last season in a disappointing finish.
“We’re fortunate to have Steve Spagnuolo, but I tell you that Vic is one of those guys,” Reid said. “He’s just one of those really creative defensive minds that survived a long time in this league. He’s been time-tested, and he has the trust of his players.”
If the Chiefs win, Reid and Mahomes will be one step closer to what coach Bill Belichick and quarterback Tom Brady while turning the Patriots into the NFL’s first dynasty of this century. They’re halfway to the six Belichick and Brady won together in New England, and Mahomes is still four away from the seven total rings won by Brady — who beat Mahomes and the Chiefs while leading the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to a Super Bowl victory to cap the 2020 season for his final title.
“I’m trying to be the greatest Patrick Mahomes that I can be,” said the Chiefs quarterback, who at age 29 already has three Super Bowl MVP honors and two NFL MVP awards. “That’s obviously a goal of anyone’s — to be the greatest at their profession — but in order to do that, you have to be the greatest that you can be every single day.
“Whenever I’m done with football, if I leave everything out there the way that I feel like I have so far as far as effort and mentality, I’ll be happy with the results.”
A win for Kansas City also would give Kelce his fourth ring, the same number of Grammy Awards his pop star girlfriend has won for best album. Overall, Kelce has 18 playoff wins and Swift has 14 Grammys.
“She’s up there being the superstar that she is and never taking no for an answer and always working her tail off,” Kelce said. “I better match that energy for sure.”