LAS VEGAS (AP) — Live updates from the Super Bowl in Las Vegas. Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m. ET, and the game will air on CBS and Nickelodeon:
Patrick Mahomes looks ready for business in Super Bowl arrival
Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes paid homage to the team that calls Allegiant Stadium home when he showed up for the Super Bowl on Sunday wearing a jet-black suit and silver tie that made him look like a fan of the AFC West-rival Las Vegas Raiders.
Mahomes appeared to be all business behind his black shades as he wheeled along his matching black Louis Vuitton luggage through the corridors of the stadium. He is trying to move into a tie for fourth behind Tom Brady, Joe Montana and Terry Bradshaw by picking up his third Super Bowl ring.
Super Bowl gates open, fans arriving in Las Vegas
Gates to Allegiant Stadium opened just after 11 a.m. local time, unleashing a flood of fans in red. Five San Francisco 49ers fans were the first let through the gates.
“Woo!” They yelled. “First ones in! We’re the first ones!”
Tony and Susan Chiosso traveled to Las Vegas from the Bay Area to watch their first-ever Super Bowl and, they hope, witness their team defeat the Kansas City Chiefs.
They think their luck so far this morning is a good indicator of which team will come out on top.
“I’m only seeing good signs today,” Tony Chiosso said.
Taylor Swift reached LAX in her journey from Tokyo to the Super Bowl, online sleuths say
Will she make it in time? Intrepid flight trackers online seem to think so.
On social media, fans of Taylor Swift and aviation journalists believe they’ve identified Swift’s private jet, labeled “The Football Era.” It arrived from Tokyo’s Haneda Airport to Los Angeles’ LAX airport just after 3:30 p.m. local time Saturday.
Her transportation plans onward to Las Vegas, where her boyfriend, NFL star tight end Travis Kelce, will play in Sunday’s Super Bowl, have yet to be revealed.
Why will the Chiefs win the Super
Bowl? Their vast experience
If the Chiefs beat the 49ers for their third Super Bowl title in four trips over the past five years, it will be for one simple reason: experience.
The Chiefs can lean on what they learned and endured over a dominant six-year run with Patrick Mahomes at quarterback. In fact, when the Chiefs beat the 49ers in Miami for their first title during this run, San Francisco quarterback Brock Purdy, wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk and many others were still in college.
Throw in the fact that Chiefs coach Andy Reid will be in his fifth Super Bowl, the third most in NFL history, and has a chance to win a third ring, and the knowledge on the Kansas City sideline will be an advantage too big for the 49ers to overcome.
Why else will KC win? Read more
Why will the 49ers win the Super Bowl? Improved QB play
The 49ers had Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs on the ropes four years ago in the Super Bowl before everything fell apart, leading to a 31-20 loss that still stings today.
The difference when the teams meet in the rematch on Sunday? This time, the 49ers will have a quarterback in Brock Purdy who is capable of making a big play down the stretch.
Purdy has gone from “Mr. Irrelevant” as the final pick in the 2022 draft to the franchise quarterback who has elevated coach Kyle Shanahan’s offense in less than two years. He led the NFL in passer rating (113) and yards per attempt (9.6), with his ability to throw deep and scramble adding new wrinkles to the offense.
Purdy also has a far better group of playmakers than the one that surrounded Jimmy Garoppolo four years ago.
Why else with SF win? Read more
Three longtime friends have attended every Super Bowl — and don’t intend to stop
As long as they still have each other, they’re still going to go to every Super Bowl.
That’s the sentiment shared by three friends who say they are the final fans who can claim membership in the exclusive “never missed a Super Bowl” club. And they’re back again for number 58 — Super Bowl 58 — this year.
The three fans, all in their 80s, are Don Crisman of Maine, Gregory Eaton of Michigan and Tom Henschel, who splits time between Florida and Pennsylvania. The three are gathering this weekend in Las Vegas for the big game, and they’re hoping they can all make it to the sixtieth edition of the game two years from now.
Taylor Swift’s connections to sports go back to her early days performing the national anthem
Before Taylor Swift grew into a global superstar and the talk of this Super Bowl, she got her singing career started by performing the national anthem at sporting events as a young child and teenager.
She sang the anthem before 45,900 fans at Game 3 of the 2008 World Series. The U.S. Open. NASCAR. The World Series. Yes, even the Double-A Reading Phillies.
Swift was an unsigned artist who looked for any kind of break by belting out the song about the land of the free and the home of the brave in front of as many packed crowds as she could find.
For Native American activists, the Kansas City Chiefs have it all wrong
Dozens of Indigenous activists have traveled to Las Vegas to gather outside the Super Bowl and demand the Kansas City Chiefs change their name and ditch their logo and gametime rituals.
Rhonda LeValdo founded and leads a group called Not In Our Honor that is calling for the changes. The Acoma Pueblo journalist and faculty member at Haskell Indian Nations University has been in the Kansas City area for more than two decades.
Everyone hopes the Chiefs-49ers Super Bowl won’t come down to an officiating call
One of the biggest fears when it comes to football’s biggest games is that a high-profile officiating mistake will play a role in the result.
So the seven on-field officials will get plenty of screen time when the Kansas City Chiefs face the San Francisco 49ers in Sunday’s Super Bowl.
The referee in charge of the crew in black-and-white unforms will be Bill Vinovich. He was also the referee when the Chiefs beat the 49ers in the Super Bowl four years ago — and when the Rams beat the Saints in the 2019 NFC championship game after an infamous missed call.
Brought to you by www.srnnews.com