The San Francisco 49ers are facing another offseason, with players and coaches wondering what they could have
done to avoid another Super Bowl loss to the Kansas City Chiefs.
What if the Niners’ fumbled punt return late in the third quarter didn’t lead to Kansas City’s first touchdown of the
game? What if quarterback Brock Purdy converted a third down and ran down the clock to kick the game-winning
field goal at the end of regulation? What if the 49ers had pushed through to score a touchdown on the first drive of
overtime instead of settling for the field goal?
And, perhaps most crucially, what if the Niners did not need to beat quarterback Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs to
end their Super Bowl drought?
“I was speechless,” defensive end Nick Bosa said of his emotions after Sunday’s 25-22 overtime loss to Kansas City in
the Super Bowl.
“There’s not really much to say at this point,” Bosa said. “This is going to hurt. It will hit in waves. But it is life.”
The 49ers are starting to get used to the feeling. They blew a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter of the 2019 Super
Bowl, losing to Mahomes and the Chiefs, when a significant stop or big completion may have reversed the result.
They then blew a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter of the 2021 NFC title game against the Rams when Jaquiski
Tartt dropped a potential interception, which proved disastrous.
