Los Angeles won its first NFL championship since the 1983 season and third all time as the Rams enjoyed a 23-20 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals in Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium.
Quarterback Matthew Stafford threw a 1-yard touchdown pass to Cooper Kupp with one minute, 25 seconds to play Sunday to complete the Rams’ comeback. Kupp was named the game’s MVP.
The Rams – whose offense is guided by Kevin O’Connell, a San Diego State alum – drove 79 yards on 15 plays in 4:48 for the winning score.
The Bengals’ attempt to even the score or go ahead ended when Joe Burrow threw an incomplete pass on fourth-and-1 from the Rams’ 49-yard line under a heavy rush by Aaron Donald with 39 seconds left.
The Rams had a 13-3 lead in the first half, but the Bengals clawed their way back thanks to a two Tee Higgins touchdowns. The Rams led at the half, 13-10, but Higgins’ next score, on the first play of the second half, put Cincinnati ahead 17-13.
The big game offered up a few big storylines. For instance:
- 2022 marks the second straight year a Super Bowl team played in its home stadium, following the winning Tampa Bay Buccaneers last year.
- The Rams made their fifth Super Bowl appearance overall and third representing L.A. But their only Super Bowl victory came in 2000, when they were based in St. Louis.
- It’s was HOT on game day, maybe the hottest kickoff in Super Bowl history. The 3:30 p.m. kickoff came with temperatures in the mid- 80s. According to the Southeast Regional Climate Center, the warmest Super Bowl kickoff occurred in 1973, also in Los Angeles at the Memorial Coliseum, it was 84 degrees.
The game also featured a pair of compelling quarterback stories. The Rams traded for star QB in Stafford during the last offseason after he languished for 12 years with the sad-sack Detroit Lions.
The Bengals, meanwhile, have young Burrow, who took the long-downtrodden Bengals to the big game in just his second NFL season.
– Staff and wire reports
