For a second consecutive year, a team will play the Super Bowl at their home stadium. The Los Angeles Rams have the honor this time around after defeating the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship Game.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers made NFL history when they played in the Super Bowl at home last year, knocking off the defending champion Kansas City Chiefs.
With the Rams now preparing for a matchup against the Cincinnati Bengals, they have the luxury of not needing to travel. L.A. has continued holding practices at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks and will even use their usual game-day locker room for the Super Bowl.
Rams head coach Sean McVay couldn’t be happier the team is staying in their home city but won’t let it distract them from their goal of winning one more game, via Alanis Thames of the New York Times:
“It’s a blessing to be able to be at home,” McVay told reporters the day after Los Angeles’ N.F.C. Championship Game win over the San Francisco 49ers. “But you also want to make sure that the magnitude of this game, even though we are playing at our home stadium, in our home city, it doesn’t take away from the focus of finishing the task at hand, and that’s trying to get one more win.”
Although the Super Bowl is being played at SoFi Stadium, the Bengals are technically the home team because of the alternating designation between AFC and NFC champions each year.
That means Cincinnati got to choose its uniform and L.A. will call the coin toss. The Bengals opted to go with their black jersey and white pants pairing, while the Rams picked their modern white throwbacks.
The Rams’ first choice would have been their blue and yellow combination but Cincinnati’s selection prevented that from happening. While L.A. is only 1-2 on the season in the modern throwbacks, 14 out of the last 17 teams to win the Super Bowl wore white.
