The San Francisco 49ers Didn’t Know The Overtime Rules. How It Affected The Result.

The San Francisco 49ers didn’t know the overtime rules. How is this possible? In the most important game of the season, to not come with the knowledge of how the rules work is malpractice. It is an indication of a failure to prepare. Many players indicated that they didn’t know that the overtime rules in the Super Bowl were different from the overtime rules in the regular season.

And it had an actual affect on the game. Had the 49ers understood the overtime rules of the Super Bowl, they most likely would have elected to receive the ball second, rather than first. In overtime in the regular season, if you score a touchdown on your first drive, you win the game.

In this scenario, you do choose to receive the ball, because it gives you a chance to win the game before the other team’s offense takes the field. If you kick it off, you could lose before you touch the ball. This might have been the thought process of the 49ers. Because they likely believed that the overtime rules in the Super Bowl were the same as in the regular season.

But the overtime rules in the Super Bowl guarantee that both teams get at least one possession. So the possibility of ending the game before the other team can go on offense is not there. And receiving the ball second has a clear advantage.

If you receive the ball second, you know what you need to do. Should your opponent score on their possession, you know that you need to score. That means that punting is not an option, and you have 4 downs to gain ten yards. You go for it on 4th down from your territory in this situation. If you receive the ball first, you might not, because you don’t want to give the ball to the other team in your territory, and can possibly stop the other team’s offense after punting.

In fact, that is exactly what happened. The 49ers kicked a field goal on their drive. The Chiefs received the ball, knowing that they needed to score. Early on in the drive, the Chiefs had a 4th and one from their side of the field. It is possible that they might have gone for it even if they had the ball first, and didn’t know for sure that they needed to score. But it is also possible that they might have punted. Or if it was say 4th and 5 from their territory. They’d have punted had they gotten the ball first, but would have gone for it had they received the ball after the 49ers scored.

There is a chance that the 49ers coaching staff did know the rules. Sources only say that certain players didn’t know the new rules. We have not yet confirmed who or how many players did and did not know the overtime rules. Maybe the 49ers coaching staff new the rules and still elected to receive the ball first.

They might have thought that they could score first and then, with arguably the best defense in the NFL, stop an under pressure Chiefs offense. It is also true that the overtime rules state that after each team has had one possession, the next score wins. That situation would favor the team that received the ball first. Because in a scenario where both teams had scored, the first team to receive the ball in overtime would be the first team to receive the ball after it became next score wins.

But such a scenario has a much lower likelihood of happening. The underlying fact of overtime rules is both teams get the ball. With that understood, it’s clear that knowing what the other team did with their possession confers a huge advantage. There’s no guarantee the 49ers get back to the Super Bowl. And they might have blown their shot to win it by not knowing the rules.

The San Francisco 49ers didn’t know the overtime rules. And their lack of knowledge might have tipped the scales against them. Along with other instances where the 49ers snatched defeat out of the claws of victory, this lack of understanding proved to be the 49ers undoing. It’s a bitter pill to swallow. But in games of small margins, knowing the rules of overtime could be the difference between winning and losing.