Tom Brady and the Buccaneers can make history in the NFL this year if they beat the Packers on Sunday. If that happens, the Buccaneers will become the first team to play a Super Bowl at their stadium.
The Super Bowl has existed for 54 years and, at that time, no team ever played the game in their stadium. The fact that the Buccaneers are still in the NFC title game is remarkable because that is something that almost never happens. You can call it the Super Bowl with bad luck or just bad luck, but teams almost never make it to the playoffs in a season when they’re hosting the Super Bowl. Including the Buccaneers, there were only nine cases in NFL history when a team made the playoffs in a season when their stadium was hosting the Super Bowl.
Of the host teams that made the postseason – the Dolphins (1970, ’78, ’94, ’98), Buccaneers (2000), Cardinals (2014), Texans (2016) and Vikings (2017) – just one of them already arrived at the conference title game and are the Vikings, who beat the Saints to advance to the NFC Championship in 2017, where they would lose to the Eagles. The Buccaneers became the second team to reach the NFC title game by also winning the Saints.
Before this year, the eight Super Bowl hosts who made the postseason had a 3-8 record in the playoffs during the season when the big game was being played at their stadium.
If the Buccaneers are going to end the Super Bowl hosting spell, they simply have to do something they’ve already accomplished this year: Beat the Packers. In week 6, the Buccaneers destroyed Green Bay 38 to 10 in a home game. This time, the Buccaneers will have to win at Lambeau Field.
In a twist, if the Buccaneers win, they will become the first wild card team to make it to the Super Bowl since the Packers did it in 2010. A victory over Green Bay would also mean the post-Buccaneers’ first home game. season would come in the Super Bowl. The Bucs opened the postseason game in Washington and then won in New Orleans.
Although neither team played a Super Bowl in their stadium, two teams managed to play the Super Bowl in their home market. After spending the season at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the Rams reached Super Bowl XIV, played at the nearby Rose Bowl. Being close to home did not help the Rams, as they lost 31-19 to the Steelers.
The only other team that played close to home was the 1984 San Francisco 49ers. In Super Bowl XIX, the 49ers defeated the Dolphins 38-16 in a game played at Stanford Stadium, which was less than 30 miles from their old home in Candlestick Park.