You’ll remember the reverse-motion plays that freed up Kadarius Toney and Skyy Moore for second-half touchdowns in Super Bowl LVII. You’ll remember Toney’s big punt return, and Patrick Mahomes’s scramble, and James Bradberry’s grab of JuJu Smith-Schuster’s jersey, and even Nick Sirianni’s fourth-and-3 decision.
What you probably don’t even remember now, a week later, is the play that every Kansas City offensive player and coach will mark as the one that set the tone for everything that would happen in the Chiefs’ come-from-behind win. Their very first play of the night.
The quarterbacks were apprised of the call in their normal Friday morning meeting, at the team’s Scottsdale, Ariz., hotel. The rest of the guys got it 24 hours later, as the team went through its Saturday walkthrough, encompassing the Chiefs’ “mock game” period, during which Andy Reid and his coaches give the offense its script for the first 15 plays. To say the guys were excited would be like calling Mahomes a pretty decent quarterback.
“I mean, we talked about it a little earlier in the week, saying they were liking the play and everything and it could be up early,” center Creed Humphrey said Friday. “Yeah, when we got the first 15, though, installed, and that was the first play, that got me fired up.”
The call: .
The concept: Old School.
The idea: Let the Eagles know what kind of game was coming.
The truth is, with what Reid, offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, offensive line coach Andy Heck, assistant O-line coach Corey Matthaei and quarterbacks coach Matt Nagy had emphasized for two weeks, and the way practices had gone, hearing the call itself could be seen as simple affirmation of the plan for the players. But since that plan diverged so drastically from the way Kansas City would normally play and countered how so many people have seen the Chiefs, knowing how the game would begin mattered.
On the play, a first-and-10 from the K.C. 25, Mahomes lined up in the shotgun, with two receivers to his right, one motioning in, and Isiah Pacheco offset to his right. At the snap, Humphrey and right tackle Andrew Wylie pulled left. Humphrey stoned Philly edge rusher Josh Sweat to create a crease for Pacheco, taking the handoff from Mahomes, and Wylie led him through it, ushering C.J. Gardner-Johnson out of the way.
Pacheco picked up only three yards. But the Chiefs were setting the tone—with the pullers taking two Eagles defenders out of the play, and Trey Smith knocking Fletcher Cox’s helmet off in finishing his block. The idea was specific to what the Chiefs wanted to do to Philly from a gameplan standpoint. It was also two years in the making.
Of course, Kansas City didn’t win the Super Bowl on a three-yard run with 10 minutes left in the first quarter. But listen to the guys executing the plan, and they’ll tell you it set the stage for everything that was coming over the three and a half hours to follow.
