SANTA CLARA — This NFL season began with the Kansas City Chiefs as the odds-on favorites to win a second straight Super Bowl. Now only the 49ers can prevent that, next Sunday in Las Vegas.
It wasn’t a wild upset that the 49ers won the NFC Championship, dethroning the Philadelphia Eagles to get a taste of revenge for last year’s exit.
It also wasn’t a given that coach Kyle Shanahan’s team could make it to the franchise’s eighth Super Bowl – four years after losing their last appearance to the Chiefs in a Super Bowl LIV collapse in Miami.
Any trip to Vegas is sure to have a story about its origin. These are the nine critical moments that booked the 49ers on a charter flight there Sunday, a week before the NFL season deals its final hand:
9. COMBO DEAL VS. CARDINALS
How does one overshadow Brock Purdy’s 20-of-21 passing effort, for a franchise-record 95.2% completion rate? By scoring four touchdowns. That is what Christian McCaffrey did. Kyle Shanahan regretfully did not get McCaffrey a fifth touchdown to match the 49ers’ franchise record held by Jerry Rice and Ricky Watters, even after the 49ers reached the 1-yard line, where the ball instead went to Kyle Juszczyk for no gain before Brock Purdy scored on a quarterback sneak. That 35-16 rout, win No. 4 in the season’s 5-0 start, set the stage for both Purdy and McCaffrey to become NFL MVP finalists.
8. ROCKED IN CLEVELAND
A 19-17 loss in rainy Cleveland on Oct. 15 offered the 49ers their first of several doses of humility this season. True, it could have been prevented had rookie kicker Jake Moody not missed a 41-yard, last-minute field goal. But the 49ers’ offense proved immortal once injuries fell McCaffrey (oblique, rib), Deebo Samuel (shoulder) and Trent Williams (ankle). Purdy’s struggles with a wet football (12-of-27, season-low 44.4% completion rate) were a harbinger of the problems he’d also encounter in the rainy playoff opener before a fourth-quarter comeback over the Packers.
7. EYE OPENER
Brock Purdy began his record-breaking season (49ers-best 4,280 yards) by promptly testing his surgically repaired elbow in the 30-7 opening win at Pittsburgh, where his second touchdown pass to a tightly covered Brandon Aiyuk showed Purdy’s let-‘er-rip aggressiveness. Not to be overlooked where Christian McCaffrey’s first steps to the NFL rushing title (152 yards, highlighted by a 65-yard touchdown to open the second half), as well as the 49ers’ defensive brilliance in denying the Steelers a first down through five possessions en route to a 20-0 lead.
6. BYE-WEEK BUMP
Nothing like a little R&R (see: rest, recovery, rehab, whatever) to recharge the 49ers’ batteries. Kyle Shanahan said the Week 9 bye was evidently needed with how tired the 49ers were after suffering a third straight loss, 31-17 to the Bengals at home. Two days after that defeat, they dealt a compensatory third-round draft pick to Washington for defensive end Chase Young, whose arrival was greatly welcomed by former Ohio State teammate Nick Bosa.
Young hasn’t panned out (2 ½ sacks in 11 games; poor effort on a Lions touchdown run last game) but the 49ers’ mere effort to get him sent a message. “We’ve collectively tried to figure out how to make the most of where we are and that’s why you trade for a guy like Chase Young in the middle of the season,” CEO Jed York said Thursday.
5. RAVENS PUNISH PURDY
No loss was more embarrassing than a 33-19 Christmas night failure against the AFC-leading Baltimore Ravens, who intercepted Brock Purdy four times, with the first coming in the end zone on the 49ers’ first drive. That swiftly ended Purdy’s candidacy and likely locked up Lamar Jackson’s NFL MVP honors. More concerning, however, was a nerve-stinger issue that shot pain through Purdy’s left shoulder and arm for a second straight game and ensured his exit with eight minutes left. That, and a concussion after their Week 7 loss in Minnesota, were Purdy’s biggest health scares in a season that depended on his right elbow’s recovery.
4. DALLAS DESTRUCTION
The 49ers’ egos swelled with their most lopsided win ever over the Dallas Cowboys, a 42-10 victory on “Sunday Night Football” for a 5-0 start to the season. Of Brock Purdy’s career-high four touchdown passes, three went to George Kittle, including a 38-yard score on “Toss 18 Flea Flick,” in which the Globetrotter-like ball dished from Purdy to McCaffrey to Deebo Samuel to Purdy then Kittle. Dallas’ Dak Prescott moved the ball in a different facet with interceptions to Fred Warner, Tashaun Gipson and Oren Burks.
3. THE GAUNTLET, AND THEN SOME
No stretch entering this season loomed larger than a three-game swing, which the 49ers swept with a Thanksgiving win in Seattle (31-13), an emotional evisceration of the Eagles in Philadelphia (42-19), and, a 28-16 regurgitation of the Seahawks at Levi’s Stadium. That stretch started with a pick-six of Purdy in Seattle before he rebounded to throw a touchdown “dot” to Aiyuk. That was the momentum they needed. Those three wins teed up the 49ers to capture their second straight NFC West title with a 45-29 Week 15 win in Arizona, where Charvarius Ward locked up his first Pro Bowl berth with two interceptions, the first of which went for his first pick-six.
2. D.C. WATCH PARTY
The 49ers had themselves a raucous New Year’s Eve celebration inside the visiting locker room at FedEx Field. After beating the Washington Commanders 27-10, players, coaches and darn near everyone scoured to watch the Arizona Cardinals upset the Philadelphia Eagles, thus locking the 49ers into the NFC playoffs’ No. 1 seed (and coveted wild-card bye).
1. CHAMPIONSHIP CONFETTI
Brandon Aiyuk saw a ladybug pregame and just knew the 49ers would beat out the Detroit Lions for a Super Bowl berth. It took a historic comeback from a 24-7 halftime deficit for that 34-31 NFC Championship win. And it was Aiyuk’s 51-yard reception that sparked it, after he acrobatically grabbed a Purdy pass that ricocheted off a cornerback’s facemask at the 4-yard line — The Aiyukiddingme Catch.
In an ensuing 2-minute, 20-second span, the 49ers got a 6-yard touchdown catch from Aiyuk, a fumble that Tashaun Gipson forced and Arik Armstead recovered, and, a McCaffrey touchdown run to pull even at 24-24 by the fourth quarter. Moody made a field goal for the lead, then key runs by Purdy, McCaffrey and ultimately Elijah Mitchell’s touchdown secured the win and sparked the fireworks and confetti shower last seen at Levi’s Stadium four years earlier – also as they headed for a Super Bowl showdown with the Chiefs. This time, it’ll be in Vegas.
“We are in a position to try and go win a Super Bowl and that’s where we are,” CEO Jed York said Thursday. “We’re going to put our chips on the table and bet on this team.”
No better place — or bettor’s place, literally — to do that than Las Vegas.
Source: www.mercurynews.com