The Super Bowl has been played every year since January 1967, and for all the one-sided finals along the way, the games that last are the ones settled in the closing minutes. Anyone looking at the Superbowl odds before a new season is backing a team to reach a game where one snap can undo five months of work. These six finals show how fine that margin can be.
Super Bowl III: the guarantee
The American Football League (AFL) was still seen as the junior partner to the National Football League (NFL) when the New York Jets met the Baltimore Colts in January 1969. The Green Bay Packers had won the first two Super Bowls comfortably, and the Colts were heavy favourites. Joe Namath publicly guaranteed a Jets win days before kick-off, then backed it up in a 16-7 victory built on a patient running game and four interceptions of Colts passers. The result persuaded many sceptics that the two leagues could meet on level terms. Although it was not close at the end, no Super Bowl result has mattered more.
Super Bowl XXIII: Montana’s 92 yards
San Francisco trailed Cincinnati 16-13 with just over three minutes left and the ball on their own eight-yard line. Joe Montana then marched the 49ers 92 yards, finishing with a 10-yard touchdown pass to John Taylor with 34 seconds remaining. San Francisco won 20-16, and Jerry Rice took the MVP award after 215 receiving yards, still a Super Bowl record.
The drive became the template for every late winning march that followed, and it is the reason Montana’s reputation for calm under pressure has never faded.
Super Bowl XXV: wide right
The New York Giants led the Buffalo Bills 20-19 in Tampa in January 1991 when Scott Norwood lined up a 47-yard field goal with eight seconds left. The kick drifted wide right, and Bill Parcells’ Giants had won the closest Super Bowl ever played. They had kept the ball for more than 40 minutes, a Super Bowl record, which kept Buffalo’s fast-paced offence on the sideline. It was the first of four straight Super Bowl defeats for the Bills.
Super Bowl XXXIV: one yard short
St Louis led Tennessee 23-16 with six seconds left, and the Titans had the ball on the Rams’ 10-yard line for one final play. Steve McNair found Kevin Dyson on a slant, but linebacker Mike Jones wrapped him up, and Dyson stretched for the line with the ball as time expired. He was a yard short. “The Tackle” remains the purest last-play finish the game has produced.
Super Bowl XLII: the perfect season ends
New England arrived in Arizona at 18-0, needing one more win for the first 19-0 season in NFL history. The Giants’ pass rush harassed Tom Brady all evening, and on the winning drive Eli Manning escaped what looked like a certain sack before David Tyree pinned the ball against his helmet for a 32-yard gain. Plaxico Burress caught the decisive touchdown with 35 seconds left, and the Giants won 17-14.
Super Bowl LI: back from 28-3
Atlanta led New England 28-3 late in the third quarter in Houston, and the trophy looked settled. The Patriots then scored 25 unanswered points, including two two-point conversions, to force the first overtime in Super Bowl history. James White’s two-yard run won it 34-28. Brady threw for 466 yards, a record at the time, and no team has come back from further behind in the final.
Why the margins stay so fine
Half of these games were won by a quarterback who stayed composed when it mattered most, and several were lost by a team that had looked the stronger for long spells. Favourites win plenty of Super Bowls, and the market is right more often than not. The closest finals, though, were decided by one tackle, one kick or one catch that nobody could have predicted in September.
That is the enduring appeal of the game. Over a 17-game season the better team usually comes out on top. Over 60 minutes in February, with everything on one result, a single play can rewrite a franchise’s history.
Betting is for over-18s only.
