Not all Super Bowl champions are created equal. Of the previous 57 Super Bowl champions, only eight were able to successfully defend their title. It's 19 years since our last back-to-back champion, which is the longest such drought of the Super Bowl era. The defending-champion Chiefs, of course, can change all of that after punching their ticket to Las Vegas with Sunday's 17-10 victory over the Ravens in the AFC Championship.
Only one franchise -- the Steelers -- has won back-to-back Super Bowls twice, doing so during the 1970s with a nucleus of players that included 11 future Hall of Famers. No team has won three straight Super Bowls, although several teams have come close. Six times, the team that won the previous year's Super Bowl lost in the big game the following year.
The 1960s Packers are the last team to win three consecutive NFL titles, but the first of those three occurred just before the start of the Super Bowl era.
Back-to-back Super Bowl champions
- 1966-67 Green Bay Packers
- 1972-73 Miami Dolphins
- 1974-75 Pittsburgh Steelers
- 1978-79 Pittsburgh Steelers
- 1988-89 San Francisco 49ers
- 1992-93 Dallas Cowboys
- 1997-98 Denver Broncos
- 2003-04 New England Patriots
Elite quarterback play is one of the biggest similarities between back-to-back champs. Every back-to-back champion featured a Hall of Fame quarterback, from Bart Starr to Joe Montana to Tom Brady.
Free agency and the salary cap are the two biggest reasons for the ongoing drought without a back-to-back champion. That being said, the Patriots and Chiefs have proven that franchises can still compete for titles on an annual basis during the NFL's modern era.
