INGLEWOOD, Calif. — A sea of orange Cincinnati Bengals jerseys, “Who Dey, ” chants and fake Cartier sunglasses filled SoFi Stadium during Sunday’s Super Bowl.
The venue hosts the Los Angeles Rams, who were facing Cincinnati, but the influx of Bengals fans made it feel like Ohio. Nevermind that the Bengals were not supposed to be here.
Not after Joe Burrow injured his knee last season and could not complete his rookie season. Not after Cincinnati used a top-five draft pick to select Ja’Marr Chase, Burrow’s favorite target at Louisiana State, instead of solidifying its offensive line, one of the worst in the league. Not while playing in the competitive A.F.C. North, where the flashy Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson and the rebuilt Cleveland Browns were supposed to rule.
The Bengals overcame those factors and made it to the Super Bowl, and they were a few plays away from winning it. Their 23-20 defeat to the Rams, while stinging, showed that Cincinnati can remain a force for years to come.
Had those plays at the end of the game gone differently, the Bengals would have hoisted the Lombardi Trophy in the Rams’ home stadium. Instead, the Los Angeles players jumped for joy on the field and ran into the end zone as time expired.
In the fourth quarter, with a 20-16 lead, Bengals receiver Tyler Boyd dropped a pass with large catch-and-run potential on third down, forcing Cincinnati to punt with over six minutes remaining. That kept Cincinnati from converting and chewing up clock. The Rams’ offense, with newfound life, marched downfield to the red zone. On two different plays, penalties committed by the Cincinnati defense gave the Rams extra chances to strike. One of them, a 1-yard touchdown pass to Cooper Kupp, succeeded, giving Los Angeles the game-winning score with 1 minute 25 seconds left. An incomplete pass on fourth down on Cincinnati’s last-ditch possession ended any chances of a Cinderella story.
“It’s a special group,” Bengals Coach Zac Taylor said in his postgame news conference. “It’s rare that you get to coach a team like this. I’m proud of the way they fought. I thought they did a lot for our team, our organization and for our city and they need to be really proud of that.”
It’s not as sweet as a fairy tale, but that the Bengals reached this pinnacle is its own kind of success. They won only four games last season and wallowed toward the bottom of the league standings. Burrow, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2020 draft, was meant to revive a franchise that had not won a playoff game since 1991. Instead, his debut season was defined by constant sacks behind one of the N.F.L.’s worst offensive lines, and he tore his left anterior cruciate ligament in Week 11.
With the fifth pick in the 2021 draft, the Bengals could have shored up their offensive line with Oregon’s Penei Sewell or Northwestern’s Rashawn Slater. But, at Burrow’s request, Cincinnati selected Chase, who won a national championship with Burrow at L.S.U. in the 2019 season. It could have been a mistake, and some thought it was, because the Bengals already had a solid receiving corps with Boyd and Tee Higgins.
But that decision ignited this Super Bowl run, and produced an exciting, young offense. With running back Joe Mixon, who rushed for 1,205 yards and 13 touchdowns, and a defense rebuilt with hardworking free agents, the Bengals won 10 games. Chase won the N.F.L.’s Offensive Rookie of the Year Award after posting 1,455 receiving yards and 13 touchdowns in the regular season. Burrow won the Comeback Player of the Year Award, rebounding from his gruesome knee injury to throw for 4,611 yards and 34 touchdowns. (His affinity for fancy sunglasses inspired the flood of fake ones on Sunday.)
In the A.F.C. North, the Bengals bested the injury-riddled Ravens, the inconsistent Browns and the underperforming Steelers, earning the No. 4 seed in the playoffs. Then this young team showed its resilience by overcoming deficits against the top-seeded Titans, who tied a postseason record with nine sacks of Burrow, and against Kansas City — both road games — to reach the Super Bowl.
“These playoff games weren’t easy, and even beyond that, we had some tough games,” Taylor said. “Our guys proved that they can do a lot of great in those situations and put us in these moments.”
And in the global spotlight, they remained calm. Instead of being distracted by the lures of Los Angeles, they kept to themselves. While the city partied around them, the players said they watched Ultimate Fighting Championship bouts. Taylor said he left his hotel room only for practices, team meetings and a trip to In-N-Out Burger. The two-year turnaround the franchise performed was impressive, and it will set the standard for the Bengals going forward. No longer the surprise contenders, for next year’s Super Bowl, they’ll be expected to be there.
“We’re a young team and you’d like to think we’d be back in this situation multiple times over the course of the next few years,” Burrow said. “You take this and you let if fuel you for the rest of our careers.”
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism