Super Bowl power rankings: Who’s the best loser?
By John Buhler
43. 1996 New England Patriots, Super Bowl XXXI
After getting embarrassed 11 years before in Super Bowl XX by the 1985 Chicago Bears, the New England Patriots put together a strong football team that was able to win the AFC under head coach Bill Parcells and franchise quarterback Drew Bledsoe.
The 1996 Patriots went 11-5 to win the AFC East. They would beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Divisional round and the Jacksonville Jaguars in the 1996 AFC Championship in Foxboro. New England would then face Brett Favre and the NFC Champion Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl XXXI, where they were stopped in their tracks in the same building they lost Super Bowl XX to another NFC Central team.
New England would enter the game as a 14-point underdog and would lose to the Packers by exactly that 14-point margin, 35-21. The game is remembered for Favre running around like a little kid after winning the Packers’ third ever Lombardi Trophy. There was also 1991 Heisman Trophy winner Desmond Howard’s electrifying Super Bowl MVP performance as a kick returner.
The Parcells era of the Patriots was a good one, but ultimately short-lived. He would coach an AFC East rival — the Jets — in the late 1990s and then the Dallas Cowboys in the early 2000s before going into NFL front office jobs. New England had talent, but Green Bay was better that Super Bowl Sunday. What also hurts this Patriots team is how much better the two other Super Bowl losing Patriots teams ended up being close to ten years later.
Next: 42. 1995 Pittsburgh Steelers