Who Played in the Super Bowl Last Year: The Eagles, the Chiefs, and the Anatomy of a 40–22 Game

The Philadelphia Eagles played the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX on February 9, 2025, at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. Philadelphia won 40–22, denying Kansas City a third straight title. The game turned on a first-half defensive demolition of Patrick Mahomes, not on the Eagles' star-studded offense.

The "last year" phrasing can mislead. Super Bowl LIX was played in February 2025; the next Super Bowl (LX) is scheduled for February 8, 2026, at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, California. Most searches asking "who played in the Super Bowl last year" resolve to the Eagles and Chiefs matchup. What follows explains why the game unfolded the way it did, how the participants earned their spots, and what the result actually proved.

How teams reach the Super Bowl

The Super Bowl is the final game of a single-elimination bracket. Each conference (AFC and NFC) seeds seven teams. Under the 2020 collective bargaining agreement, only the top seed in each conference receives a first-round bye, meaning exactly two of the 32 clubs skip Wild Card weekend. The remaining six per conference play in three Wild Card games.

Those 14 playoff teams are split four ways per conference: four division winners plus three Wild Card qualifiers. Division winners are seeded 1 through 4 by regular-season record, with tiebreakers. The bye is a structural advantage, not a formality. A bye team plays three games to win the Lombardi Trophy; a Wild Card team must win four.

Road teams face an additional stressor: travel. The 2025 playoff field included teams crossing multiple time zones, which compounds fatigue on a short week. The bracket math is why a 14-3 top seed and a 10-7 Wild Card team can meet in a conference title game with very different rest profiles.

Each conference champion then advances to the Super Bowl, which is seeded at a neutral site. The Eagles and Chiefs each won their conference championship games in January 2025 to reach New Orleans.

What made the Eagles' 40–22 win happen

The score suggests a shootout. It was not. Philadelphia led 24–0 at halftime and 34–0 early in the fourth quarter. The mechanism was pressure: the Eagles' defensive front generated consistent interior and edge pressure without blitzing, forcing Mahomes into hurried throws and turnovers.

The Chiefs' offensive line was outmatched. Mahomes was sacked and hit repeatedly, and Kansas City's first-half drives stalled because the run game could not stay ahead of the chains. When a quarterback faces pressure on early downs, the entire play-action and screen architecture collapses.

Philadelphia's offensive approach was deliberately low-variance. The Eagles leaned on a strong run game and efficient short passing, controlling possession and clock. This is a common championship pattern: a defense that wins the line of scrimmage plus an offense that avoids turnovers. The Chiefs scored 22 points, but much of that came after the game was effectively decided.

The counterintuitive detail: Kansas City's dynasty credentials made the Eagles underdogs in narrative terms, yet the line-of-scrimmage matchup favored Philadelphia. Championship experience matters, but it does not block a four-man rush.

Why the bracket produced this matchup

The Eagles entered the playoffs as a high seed in the NFC. Kansas City entered as the AFC's top contender with a bye and home-field advantage through the conference title game. The bracket placed the strongest pass rush against a team that had relied on quarterback improvisation.

The 40–22 result fits a broader pattern in Super Bowl history. Blowouts are more common than the "any given Sunday" narrative implies. Since the game's inception, margins of 18 points or more have occurred in a meaningful share of matchups, and the largest margins (such as the 49ers' 55–10 win in Super Bowl XXIV) reflect similar line-of-scrimmage dominance.

The underdog label attached to Philadelphia was partly a media artifact. Oddsmakers priced the game closer than the final score. The mechanism was not a fluke; it was a structural mismatch.

Where the "last year" question goes wrong

The most common error is mixing seasons and calendar years. The Super Bowl played in February 2025 is the championship of the 2024 NFL season. People who say "last year's Super Bowl" may mean the game played in February 2024 (Super Bowl LVIII, Chiefs vs. 49ers) or February 2025.

Here are red flags that a source is confusing seasons:

A headline dated January 2025 calling the Eagles–Chiefs game "next year's Super Bowl." A stats page listing the game under "2024 season" without noting the February 2025 date. A recap that names the 2024 participants but uses 2025 dates. A schedule page showing Super Bowl LIX under the wrong season label. A social post referencing "last year" during the 2025–26 season when it means February 2025.

Another misconception: that the Super Bowl participants are chosen by a vote or committee. They are not. The bracket is deterministic once seeding is set, and tiebreakers are codified in league rules.

Practical steps for verifying the matchup

If you need to confirm who played in a given Super Bowl, use primary sources and check three things: the game's official name (Roman numeral), the date played, and the season it concluded.

Check the NFL's official Super Bowl results page for the Roman numeral, date, and final score. Cross-reference the date against the season. A February 2025 game belongs to the 2024 season. Verify the venue and city, since neutral-site records help disambiguate. Confirm the final score, because recaps sometimes omit the margin. Check the conference champions for the same season to confirm both participants.

For a quick sanity check, the date is the strongest anchor. February games always conclude the prior calendar year's season.

Comparison: Super Bowl LIX vs. recent title games

The table shows how thin the margins usually are. Super Bowl LIX's 18-point result was an outlier relative to the three-point nail-biters that preceded it. That contrast is the professional caveat: one game's scoreline says little about the matchup quality on paper.

Timeline of the 2024 season to Super Bowl LIX

The timeline matters because the two-week gap between conference championships and the Super Bowl is a recovery and preparation window. Teams use it for scheme installation and injury treatment. The Eagles' defensive front entered that window healthier than Kansas City's offensive line, which shaped the matchup.

What the result does and does not prove

The Eagles' win validated a roster built on line play. It did not prove that Kansas City's dynasty was over, nor that Philadelphia would repeat. Single-game outcomes in football are noisy: turnovers, injuries, and officiating variance can swing results.

The deeper lesson is structural. The team that controls the line of scrimmage on both sides tends to win championship games, because pressure disrupts the highest-leverage position on the field. That principle is stable across eras, independent of rule changes.

The article is general educational information about a sporting event, not a prediction or betting recommendation. For any wagering or financial decision tied to sports outcomes, consult a qualified professional and follow local regulations.