Ravens at Titans playoff game will feature something the NFL postseason hasn't seen in 32 years

This almost never happens in the playoffs

It's not often you see the NFL's top-two rushing teams face each other in the playoffs, but that's exactly what will be happening on Sunday in Nashville when Tennessee hosts Baltimore for a wild-card game. 

In an era where nearly every team in the NFL loves to throw the ball, the Ravens and Titans have gone against the grain and their throwback strategy means we're going to be getting a postseason rarity: This week's game will mark the first time in nearly 32 years that the NFL's top-two rushing teams have faced each other in the playoffs. 

The last time it happened came in January 1989 when the Bengals and 49ers met up in Super Bowl XXIII. In that game, the 49ers and their No. 2 rushing offense narrowly beat a Bengals team that ranked No. 1 overall in rushing in 1988. Although the Bengals had the NFL MVP on their team that year in Boomer Esiason, they still managed to average 169.4 yards per game on the ground. As for the 49ers, their ground attack averaged 157.6 yards per game even though they had Joe Montana under center. 

Neither team came anywhere close to their season average as the 49ers totaled 111 rushing yards while the Bengals ended with 106 yards in San Francisco's 20-16 Super Bowl win. 

The Ravens-Titans game will mark the just the fourth time that the top-two rushing teams have met in the postseason since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970. Besides Super Bowl XXIII, there was also the 1972 AFC Championship that featured an undefeated Dolphins team (211.4 yards per game during the season) going up against the Steelers (180 yards per game). The other meeting came in the 1970 divisional round between the Cowboys (164.3) and Lions (151.9).

In the three previous meetings, the team that led the NFL in rushing yards has gone 2-1 with the Dolphins (21-17) and Cowboys (5-0) both winning. Also, that is not a typo, the Cowboys won a playoff game 5-0. 

This year, Baltimore will be going into the postseason on the heels of winning the regular season rushing title. The Ravens averaged 191.9 yards per game on the ground this year, which led the NFL by more than 20 yards. The only team that even came close to matching them was the Titans, who finished second overall with an average of 168.1 yards per game (No other team in the NFL even averaged 150 yards). Not only did they rank one and two in rushing this year, they were also two of the three teams in the NFL that called more run plays than pass plays in 2020 (The Patriots were the other one). 

Although they were the top-two teams in rushing yards, there was a stark difference in how they got there. The Titans are more a one-man show while the Ravens are more of a running back by committee. The Ravens had three players finish the year with more than 700 yards rushing, including Lamar Jackson, who ended the season with 1,005. 

As for the Titans, Derrick Henry finished the season with 2,027 yards, which is the fifth-highest total in NFL history. Henry could continue to make history on Sunday: If he hits the 150-mark, he'll tie Terrell Davis for the most games in playoff history with at least 150 yards rushing. 

The run game will be important to both teams, but it will probably be slightly more important to the Titans and that's because they went 2-3 this year in games where they got out-rushed by their opponent and 9-2 when they had more rushing yards. As for the Ravens, they went 3-2 when they got out-rushed and 8-3 when they had more yards on the ground than their opponent. 

This game will mark the third time these two teams have faced each other over the past 12 months and not only did the Titans win both games, but they out-rushed the Ravens each time.