Kansas City Chiefs WIN the Super Bowl with Mecole Hardman clinching an ASTONISHING victory and sending Taylor Swift wild in the stands as she cheered Travis Kelce to glory – even after he SHOVED coach Andy Reid when it all threatened to go wrong
Kansas City Chiefs overturned a 10-point deficit and a furious Travis Kelce meltdown to beat the San Francisco 49ers 25-22 in overtime and join the elite list of teams to win back-to-back Super Bowls.
Mecole Hardman caught the decisive touchdown pass on a night where Patrick Mahomes refused to accept his team would ever be beaten, meaning the Chiefs become the first champions to win two straight Super Bowls since the New England Patriots 20 years ago in 03-04.
Trailing 10-3 at halftime and at one stage, 10-0, the Chiefs looked in dire straights with Kelce going too far in embracing the ‘villains’ reputation he spoke about in the build-up to the game. The tight end shoved his 65-year-old coach, Andy Reid, and screamed in his face in the second quarter when he was taken out of a play that ended in Isiah Pacheco uncharacteristically fumbling.
Kansas City were down by seven at the interval but they ended the third quarter in the lead when Marquez Valdes-Scantling got the first touchdown for the Chiefs after a fumble on the punt by Ray-Ray McCloud III. The 49ers retook the lead early in the fourth through Jauan Jennings before Harrison Butker tied it up at 16-16 with his third field goal of the game.
Jake Moody nailed a 53-yard field goal for a 19-16 lead that looked like it could take San Francisco to glory but with less than 10 seconds left on the clock and a vital 22-yard burst from Kelce when his team badly needed it, Butker got the Chiefs level at 19-19 by the end of the fourth quarter. Overtime. And it was there that Hardman, who started the season with the New York Jets before being traded to Kansas City, engraved his name into the NFL history books.
Travis Kelce celebrates Super Bowl glory on a night he could so easily have been the villain for the Kansas City Chiefs
Kelce had a moment of madness as he screamed at his coach Andy Reid in the second quarter of the Super Bowl
Swift made it back to take her place in the $1million Kelce family suite with her crew and his family a row behind
Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker (7) kicks a field goal to take the Super Bowl into overtime with San Francisco 49ers
After the first quarter ended with neither team scoring, San Francisco took the lead at the start of the second when Jake Moody made Super Bowl history by converting the longest kick in its history at 55 yards (a feat would later be beaten by Butker). It would have been good from longer out, too.
And then Christian McCaffrey, who fumbled in the first quarter, rubbed salt in the wounds with the first touchdown of the night and the 49ers led by 10. Butker trimmed the deficit to seven points with a 28-yard kick but the Chiefs still trailed by seven at the halftime interval – both Mahomes and Brock Purdy threw for 123 yards in the first half.
In the third quarter Butker eclipsed Moody’s record with a 57-yard field goal of his own to cut San Francisco’s lead to four before Valdes-Scantling’s TD. Things had seemed to go noticeably wrong for the Chiefs after Moody’s kick for the 49ers in the second quarter – even though they hadn’t really been going too right up to then, either.
In response to Moody’s kick from range, Mahomes picked out Mecole Hardman with a 52-yard bomb but in the next play, wide receiver Pacheco uncharacteristically fumbled. He apologized to each member of his teammate on the bench at Allegiant Stadium.
But as the Chiefs made their way off the field, Kelce appeared to come to blows with Reid, the coach he so often speaks of how much he respects.
Then, on the next offense, Mahomes lost 10 yards for intentional grounding in a moment where they needed the quarterback to step up before McCaffrey’s touchdown. Things were threatening to unravel.
But the 49ers hadn’t had it their own way up to then. Running back McCaffrey, so often imperious with the ball under his arm, fumbled in the opening minutes for the first time since Week 7 – a run of over three-and-a-half months that came to an end early on in the biggest stage of them all.
For both him and Pacheco, they were deeply uncharacteristic errors.
And in the second quarter, 49ers star Dre Greenlaw appeared to tear his left Achilles as he watched Pacheco fumble the ball. He leapt up into the air in celebration before sprinting onto the field, and his left leg gave way int he cruelest of circumstances.
The Chiefs had no early successes of their own to shout about in the first quarter. Chiefs quarterback Mahomes was sacked when Chase Young broke through the Chiefs O-Line.
Usher took over Allegiant Stadium for the halftime show, bringing out guests Alicia Keys and Ludacris for this show but not even his star-studded performance could distract from a Super Bowl that will go down as one of the most breathtaking ever.
The action began at Allegiant Stadium shortly before 7pm EST – 4pm local time – after country music icon Reba McEntire had belted out the national anthem. Kelce’s girlfriend Swift had made a mad dash back from Japan for the game after playing four straight nights on her Eras Tour in Tokyo
She was joined in a suite – that boyfriend Travis is believed to have paid $1million for – with the rest of the Kelce family, her own mom and dad, and friends Ice Spice and Blake Lively.
She was seen giving Jason, the older Kelce brother, a hug as they reunited and he then introduced himself tot he American rapper Ice Spice – scenes that NFL fans wouldn’t have ever believed possible when the season began back in September.
The Chiefs won the toss before the start of the game and deferred, so the 49ers started with the ball in the battle for the Vince Lombardi trophy.
For Travis and the Chiefs, the game finally getting underway drew a line under two weeks of intense build-up, where the tight end in particular faced a new wave of attention due to his girlfriend. But after a night like this, where Kelce leaves the hero on a night that could have easily been a new low for him, the attention will only grow from here.
For now though, Sin City and party after party awaits. Kelce will be back next year, with Mahomes, targeting a three-peat. They couldn’t, could they?
