History Of The NFL Championship: A List of Super Bowl Champions

According to a recent article on put out by Advertising Age (see the article here), the most recent Harris Poll on the favorite American sports, Professional Football was a far and away winner as the most popular. Therefore, it is easy to see why the games premier event, which determines the NFL Champion each year, is so massively popular. Famously called 'The Super Bowl,' since 1967, the game pits the top two teams in the league against each other, and since the game's inception there have been 47 teams crowned Superbowl winners, spread out across a wide array of different franchises.

Let's take a look at some more details about the format of the NFL Playoffs and the Super Bowl itself, as well as a full look at the list of Super Bowl Champions since 1967.

There are a number of more detailed rules and situations that exist within the Playoff format, but let's take a look at the basic structure now and how it has changed:

Since the American Football League and the National Football League merged and became the AFC and NFC, the Super Bowl game has placed the winner of the AFC against the winner of the NFC. There are currently 4 divisions of 4 teams within each conference and in order to get to a playoff system, the current format is as follows:

• 6 teams from each conference qualify. This is the four division winners and two 'Wildcards' who are the two teams with the best records that didn't win their division.
• The 3 and 4 seed division winners play a game against a Wildcard team, leaving 4 teams, who then play against each other, organized by highest seed against lowest seed, in the Divisional round.
• Then, with two teams left in each league, they play for the AFC and NFC Championships, with the winners playing to determine the Super Bowl Champion.

In the past, there was only 4 qualifying teams in each conference, with the double Wildcard being a relatively recent addition. There was also originally only 3 divisions, meaning there was just one Wildcard at that time.

There are currently 14 NFL Teams that have never been Super Bowl Champions, although a number of these teams such as the Jacksonville Jaguars or the Houston Texans are relatively new franchises.

Since the game began in 1967, there have been 18 different teams that could call themselves Super Bowl winners. Some many times, others only once. Here is the breakdown by team from most Super Bowl Championships to least not counting those who have not won):

• 6 Wins - Pittsburgh Steelers
• 5 Wins - Dallas Cowboys, San Francisco 49ers
• 4 Wins - Green Bay Packers, New York Giants
• 3 Wins - New England Patriots, Washington Redskins, Los Angeles/Oakland Raiders
• 2 Wins - Denver Broncos, Miami Dolphins, Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts, Baltimore Ravens
• 1 Win - Los Angeles/St. Louis Rams, Kansas City Chiefs, Chicago Bears, New York Jets, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New Orleans Saints

• Only 4 teams in NFL History have never appeared in a single Super Bowl Championship. These teams are: Jacksonville Jaguars, Cleveland Browns, Houston Texans and the Detroit Lions
• The record for the most Super Bowl appearances without a victory is 4, and is held by the Minnesota Vikings and the Buffalo Bills.
• The Dallas Cowboys and Pittsburgh Steelers have faced each other in the Super Bowl 3 times, which is currently the most of any two teams.
• The record for the highest Superbowl attendance is held by Super Bowl XIV, in 1980, with 103,985 people. The game was held at the Rose Bowl.
• A Super Bowl Champion has never been decided by a game that went to overtime.