Tom Brady and Patrick Mahomes are used to making history. Brady, with a record six Super Bowl rings already in his possession, will go for a seventh when the Buccaneers face the Chiefs in Super Bowl LV on Feb. 7 on CBS. Brady's counterpart, Patrick Mahomes, made history last year by becoming the first player to win Super Bowl and league MVP honors before his 25th birthday. A win in Super Bowl LV would make Mahomes the youngest quarterback in history to win multiple Super Bowls.
As soon as they take their first snaps in Super Bowl LV, Brady and Mahomes will make even more NFL history. Brady and Mahomes will become the first winning quarterbacks from the previous two Super Bowls to face each other in the Super Bowl, as noted by NFL Network's Rich Eisen. Brady is two years removed from leading the Patriots to a 13-3 win over the Rams in Super Bowl LIII. Last February, Mahomes rallied the Chiefs to a come-from-behind win over the 49ers to claim Kansas City's first title in 50 years.
While the previous two Super Bowl winning quarterbacks have never faced each other in the Super Bowl, there have been six previous Super Bowls played between quarterbacks who had already won a Super Bowl. Here's a look at the quarterbacks who took part in those games.
| Super Bowl | Quarterbacks | Result |
|---|---|---|
X | Roger Staubach (DAL), Terry Bradshaw (PIT) | |
XIII | Roger Staubach (DAL), Terry Bradshaw (PIT) | Steelers 35, Cowboys 31 |
XVIII | Jim Plunkett (LAR), Joe Theismann (WAS) | Raiders 38, Washington 9 |
XLIII | Ben Roethlisberger (PIT), Kurt Warner (ARI) | Steelers 27, Cardinals 23 |
XLVI | Tom Brady (NE), Eli Manning (NYG) | Giants 21, Patriots 17 |
XLIX | Tom Brady (NE), Russell Wilson (SEA) | Patriots 28, Seahawks 24 |
In the previous six games between Super Bowl winning quarterbacks, a quarterback took home the MVP award on three occasions. In Super Bowl XIII, Bradshaw, the league's MVP that season, won his first of two consecutive Super Bowl MVP awards after throwing for 318 yards and four touchdowns in Pittsburgh's second Super Bowl win over Dallas. In the second half of Super Bowl XLVI, Eli Manning helped engineer three scoring drives to help the Giants win their second Super Bowl over the Patriots. In Super Bowl XLIX, Brady's two fourth quarter touchdown passes gave him his fourth Super Bowl ring and third Super Bowl MVP award.
Brady is 2-1 in the Super Bowl against quarterbacks that have already won a ring. His first Super Bowl win came at the expense of Kurt Warner, whose Rams fell to the Patriots in one of the greatest upsets in Super Bowl history. Sandwiched between that win and the Patriots' win over the Seahawks is New England's four-point loss to Eli Manning's Giants in Super Bowl XLVI. Four years earlier, Manning and the Giants had stunned Brady and the previously undefeated Patriots in Super Bowl XLII, 17-14. Overall, Brady is 6-3 in the Super Bowl, and his six Super Bowl wins are two more than the second-winningest Super Bowl quarterbacks: Bradshaw and Joe Montana. His four Super Bowl MVP awards are one more than Montana, who went 4-0 in Super Bowls as the 49ers' quarterback.
The specter of facing the most experienced quarterback in Super Bowl history is not lost on Mahomes, who was asked about his soon-to-be Super Bowl counterpart following Kansas City's victory over Buffalo.
"Yeah I mean, the Super Bowl is the Super Bowl. Being able to go up against one of the greatest, if not the greatest quarterback of all time in his 150th Super Bowl," said Mahomes, who is 1-1 against Brady in his career. "I mean it's going to be a great experience for me. To go out there and get to have a chance to repeat and get to do it against the best, I mean it's something special and I'm excited for the opportunity."
