February 2nd, 2020. Around 10pm, in Miami Florida, the Kansas City Chiefs won their second Super Bowl in 50 years. Chiefs fans across the world celebrated the sought after victory, tasting something they have not had since the 60’s. Flash forward through a pandemic, a wild offseason, a bumpy regular season and a return to form in the playoffs, the Chiefs were back in the big game. This time facing the only quarterback to ever beat Patrick Mahomes in a playoff game, Tom Brady. In a clash of legendary quarterbacks, highflying offenses, and two mastermind head coaches, Super Bowl 55 is shaping up to be a great conclusion to the NFL season.

Each team is littered with talent, on both sides of the ball. They both matchup in all phases of the game. So how is one team supposed to win? It is anyone’s game, and both teams are red hot.

Tom Brady and company ended the regular season with seven straight wins. In fact, their last loss of the season was against KC, in a week 12 game.

On the other side, the Chiefs have not lost a game since week 5 with Mahomes under center. Mahomes leads a dynamic explosive offense with Hill, Kelce, the return of Watkins, and an exciting rookie in Clyde Edwards-Helaire.

The Buccaneers have just as much talent if not a little more. Evans, Godwin, Miller, a two headed monster on the ground and a rejuvenated Gronk. A fun offense to watch when firing on all cylinders.

On the defense, KC is not full of big names, but a few stars shine bright. Mathieu is a great leader for that defense, Sneed is a breakout rookie, one of the best all year. Chris Jones and playoff Frank Clark hold down the defensive line. Lots of talent on a very underrated unit.

The Bucs have the more flashy names, and it reflects in their play as well. Jason Pierre-Paul(JPP) and Shaq Barrett dominate the line, not to mention Vita Vea returning from injury. Lavonte David is a stud and Devin White has had an amazing postseason. The secondary was beat up by Tyreek Hill in week 12, but expect them to have made drastic changes in level of play and gameplan.

With two evenly matched teams it should be a great game. In my opinion, the deciding factor on who wins this game is the battle in the trenches. The Buccaneers defensive line versus the Chiefs offensive line.

The Bucs dominated the Packers at the line of scrimmage in both games they played. The amount of pressure, hits and sacks put on soon-to-be-MVP Aaron Rodgers led to him throwing multiple interceptions and overall threw him off his game. That goes to show the effect the duo of Barrett and JPP have.

The Chiefs, unfortunately, are going to be missing both their starting tackles. Eric Fisher ended his season with a torn achilles against the Bills, and all-pro right tackle Mitchell Schwartz has been out most of the season. This is a huge blow to KC and a big advantage for Tampa Bay. Not only is KC missing both tackles, but they are only playing one starter from week one. Austin Reiter at center.

It has been a bad year for the Chiefs offensive line and that has been very clear. They have struggled at pass blocking for Mahomes and the run game in between the tackles has been non existent. If the Chiefs struggle against the Tampa Bay pass rush like they have all year, expect this game to look like the Super Bowl from a year ago. Ugly for the Chiefs offense. Tom Brady is not making the mistakes the 49ers did on offense. He isn’t overthrowing the game winning touchdown.

It will be a good game however. Mahomes will be Mahomes, even without a good offensive line. Just do not expect the Chiefs to pull off the magic they did last year if they cannot protect their signal caller. My final game prediction is 28-24 Chiefs. Patrick Mahomes winning Super Bowl MVP for a second year in a row and the Chiefs are just the 9th team in history to win back to back Super Bowls.