As a fan, there are a lot of dynamics to consider when it comes to the schedule release and what to hope for.
Many fans hope for early-season home games to take advantage of milder weather so they’re not freezing their tucheses for the whole month of December. I’ll never forget the December stomping we took from the Patriots in 2010, where it was 31-3 at halftime and about 10 degrees outside, and thinking, “Why did we decide to come to this game?”
There are also competitive considerations that may provide an advantage depending on when they occur. Joe Marino has pointed out that getting the Patriots early might be beneficial before they’ve had a chance to gel with the new coaching staff, whereas the Jets might make sense to have later, as having tape on how they plan to utilize their new talent might be more helpful
However, for the purposes of this article, we’re seeing it through a different lens today.
It’s preseason. It’s time to be the most hopeful we can be. We aren’t just hoping for a good season. We are hoping for a Super Bowl win.
With that in mind, I took a look at the past 5 Super Bowl winners’ schedules and saw commonalities and trends between all of them. If we want the Bills to win the Super Bowl, what should we be hoping for from the upcoming schedule release that would match up most with previous champs?
Here were the last five Super Bowl winners we examined:
2024 – Philadelphia Eagles
2023 – Kansas City Chiefs
2022 – Los Angeles Rams
2021 – Tampa Bay Buccaneers
2020 – Kansas City Chiefs
When to Play Divisional Opponents
Of the five champs, 2 of them didn’t play a division opponent until week 6.
Three champs only faced 2 divisional opponents in the first 9 weeks.
All five faced 2 or more divisional opponents in the final 3 weeks of the season.
What we should hope for:
A Super Bowl schedule for the Bills would look like:
- 1 October game against the Jets
- 2 November games against the Jets and Patriots
- 3 December games with 1 against the Patriots and 2 against the Dolphins.
Game Times:
Good teams tend to be selected for prime time games and international games, both of which have the potential to change our normal game time traditions.
During the drought, it was easy to plan for because most games were on Sunday at 1:00.
Recent years have seen us rarely maintain that time slot for more than a week or two at a time and that causes us to have to create alternative ways to celebrate Bills’ games.
After all, it’s hard to consume that much by 9:30 am … though we’ve proven it can be done.
We should expect that pattern to continue, so get ready for lots of lost sleep on school nights.
Of the previous five champs, 4 schedules had 7-9 games in their normal home game time slot (1:00 for east coast teams, 4:00ish west of the Mississippi). The 2020 chiefs were the biggest aberration as they only had 2 games played in their normal 4:25 ET home game slot.
Every champ had at least 4 night games, with many having five.
Three of the five champs also had an international game.
What we should hope for:
An ideal Super Bowl Schedule for the Bills would have
- 9 1:00 pm games
- 4 night games
- 1 international game likely in the 9:30 ET Time slot
- 3 games at 4:30
Strength of Schedule
This one we already know.
Of the previous champs, 4 of them had a easier strength of schedule than half of the league. The strength of schedule preseason looks at their opponents records in the previous years and averages them together to find a combined average record expressed as a percentage in decimal form. They’re then typically ranked in descending order by difficulty, with 1st being the hardest and 32 being the easiest.
Here is how the previous champs lined up
- 2024 Eagles: 21st – .491
- 2023 Chiefs: 16th – .481
- 2022 Rams: 1st – .567
- 2021 Buccaneers: 29th – .465
- 2020 Chiefs: 18th – .500
As you can see, with 4 of the champs having opponents with .500 records or worse, having an “easier” schedule relative to the rest of the league generally leads to more success in the Super Bowl.
This one we already know as the Buffalo Bills opponents have already been established and the Bills come in at 23rd with an opponent win percentage of .467.
This checks the box and puts them in line with 4 out of 5 previous champs as they’ll be facing teams more on the building side of team development. Is it guarantee? Of course not, but I want to see Mitchell Trubisky in the V formation as much as possible and see developmental guys get game reps with us up by 20+ in the fourth quarter.
Ideal Super Bowl Schedule
Putting it all together, here is one iteration of what a schedule might look like if it were to mimic the Super Bowl winners of the past five years.
| Week Number | Opponent | Home/Away | Time |
| 1 | Baltimore Ravens | Home | Sunday @ 8:15 |
| 2 | New Orleans Saints | Home | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 3 | Philadelphia Eagles | Home | Thursday @ 8:15 |
| 4 | Pittsburgh Steelers | Away | Sunday @ 9:30 in Dublin, Ireland |
| 5 | Cleveland Browns | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 6 | Jets | Home | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 7 | Kansas City Chiefs | Home | Sunday @ 4:10 |
| 8 | Atlanta Falcons | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 9 | ***BYE*** | ***BYE*** | ***BYE*** |
| 10 | Tampa Bay Buccaneers | Home | Sunday @ 8:15 |
| 11 | Jets | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 12 | Patriots | Home | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 13 | Cincinnati Bengals | Home | Monday @ 7:00 |
| 14 | Carolina Panthers | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 15 | Houston Texans | Away | Sunday @ 4:15 |
| 16 | Miami Dolphins | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 17 | New England Patriots | Away | Sunday @ 1:00 |
| 18 | Miami Dolphins | Home | Sunday @ 1:00 |
If the Bills end up with a schedule like this, you might want to start planning that trip to Vegas for February.
What matchups are you hoping to see?