The Los Angeles Rams have the incredible opportunity this season to host both the NFC Championship Game and Super Bowl 56 in their own stadium. Will this be the first time that either an NFC or AFC Championship Game has been hosted in the same venue as the Super Bowl that would follow it?
This will be the first time the same stadium hosts an NFC or AFC Championship Game and a Super Bowl
In 56 years of the Super Bowl, 2022 will be the first time a Conference Championship will take place in the same stadium as the Super Bowl. Last season, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers became the first team to play the Super Bowl in their own stadium. However, they went on the road last season to play the NFC title game in Green Bay.
The Vikings also came close to hosting both the NFC Championship Game and the Super Bowl in the 2017 season. Minnesota traveled to the Eagles to play the NFC Championship Game. The Vikings were a second seed that year, and a loss for the Eagles in the Divisional Round would have made Minnesota the first team to host both games.
Non-NFL stadiums hosted the Super Bowl for multiple years
Not helping the cause for a team to host both games was the NFL’s decision to use stadiums outside the NFL circuit during the first 27 Super Bowls. More than a quarter of the first 27 Super Bowls were played at venues that did not house an NFL team at the time, including five played at the Rose Bowl (Super Bowls XI, XIV, XVII, XXI, and XXVII).
Additionally, Super Bowl VIII took place at Rice Stadium. While Rice Stadium was once the home of the Houston Oilers, they had moved to the Astrodome several years prior. Super Bowl XIX went down at Stanford Stadium, which has never housed an NFL team.
California has hosted NFC and AFC Championship Games and Super Bowls in the same year but in different stadiums
Super Bowl LVI will be the sixth time that the state of California has hosted both the AFC or NFC Championship Game and the Super Bowl. The only other state to have hosted a title game and a Super Bowl is Texas back in 1973 with Super Bowl VIII. That time, the Cowboys hosted the NFC Championship Game, with Rice Stadium in Houston hosting the Super Bowl.
On four of the previous five occasions that California has done the double, San Francisco or Oakland hosted their respective Conference Championship before heading to either Pasadena or San Diego for the Super Bowl. The NFC Championship Game and Super Bowl occurred in the San Francisco area in 1984. The 49ers hosted the title game at Candlestick Park, with Stanford Stadium hosting the Super Bowl.