Chiefs try for Super Bowl three-peat; Eagles up early in 2nd

The Kansas City Chiefs are trying to become the first team to win three straight Super Bowls as they face the Philadelphia Eagles in the Superdome. It’s a rematch from two years ago when Jalen Hurts nearly led Philadelphia to a championship only to watch Patrick Mahomes snatch it away by rallying Kansas City to a 38-35 win. Mahomes lifted the Chiefs to an overtime win against San Francisco in another Super Bowl rematch last year. Now, they’re poised for a three-peat.

Super Bowl 59 is underway, with the Kansas City Chiefs facing a familiar foe, the Philadelphia Eagles, hoping to win the Lombardi Trophy for a record third year in a row.

Eagles 7, Chiefs 0

The extra point is good and Philadelphia leads 7-0 with 6:15 left in the first quarter.

That 1-yard rush by Hurts made him the fifth player with four Super Bowl rushing touchdowns in a career. Emmitt Smith has the most, with five. Thurman Thomas, Franco Harris, John Elway and now Hurts all have four.

TOUCHDOWN: Hurts opens the scoring at Super Bowl

Philadelphia has struck first in the Super Bowl, with Jalen Hurts — thanks to the Eagles’ famed tush push, where the offensive line just bullies their way into the end zone and Hurts follows the crowd — scoring the game’s first touchdown.

Now it’s the Chiefs fans complaining about the officials

Kansas City appeared to get a third-down stop against Philadelphia, but Trent McDuffie was called for a personal foul for making contact with Dallas Goedert’s face mask.

Tom Brady didn’t like this call, either.

It’s not just Messi at the Super Bowl. He’s with friends

Lionel Messi isn’t the only Inter Miami star at the Super Bowl.

Teammates Jordi Alba, Sergio Busquets and Luis Suarez are there with him, taking a break from the preseason before resuming training in South Florida later this week.

The group famously were all teammates at Barcelona a decade ago, before reuniting to play in MLS with Inter Miami.

Fans inside Superdome boo Taylor Swift, Ice Spice

The fans inside the Superdome booed when Taylor Swift was shown alongside Ice Spice on the big screens during a break in the first quarter.

Swift has drawn the ire of many NFL fans, who say that TV broadcasts show too much of her. She has been dating Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce since early last season.

Swift was shown just after the cameras panned among actors Rob McElhenney, Adam Sandler and Paul Rudd. She gave a bit of a side-eye when she realized she was getting booed on the big screens, and kind of wrinkled her nose a bit.

Dunkin’ snags first ad spot

Dunkin’ snagged the first ad spot of the game — with the Massachusetts-based chain again enlisting Ben Affleck to represent “The DunKings.”

“The DunKings” were introduced at the Super Bowl ad last year, with Affleck and stars like Tom Brady and Matt Damon showing off their Boston (and Dunkin’) pride through a boy-band like performance. But it appears the team has changed some since.

In Dunkin’s ad this year, Affleck’s brother Casey, Bill Belichick and Jeremy Strong are new members of the group.

The first big penalty of the game went in Kansas City’s favor.

The Eagles were going for it on fourth-and-2 from midfield and appeared to convert a 30-yard completion. But a flag came out for Brown putting his hand on cornerback Trent McDuffie’s face, leading to the questionable penalty.

A big topic heading into the game was perceived bias for officials in favor of the Chiefs. Commissioner Roger Goodell called it “ridiculous” but those complaints will only grow louder after that first penalty.

Fox breaks out new scorebug for Super Bowl

It’s a different look showing time and score at the bottom of your screen for the Super Bowl.

And social media isn’t loving what Fox is doing.

Fox has “KC” on one side in red, “PHI” on the other in green, with score in big white numerals. There’s also some different graphic elements than the norm as well.

Chiefs defer, 15th straight Super Bowl to open that way

For the 15th straight Super Bowl, the team that won the opening coin toss of a Super Bowl chose to defer.

Kansas City won the toss and gave Philadelphia the option to start with the ball. The Chiefs will get the ball to begin the second half.

The only team to choose to start a Super Bowl with the ball after winning the opening toss since the defer option was initiated in the 2008 season was the Saints in Super Bowl 44 against Indianapolis.

The coin toss winner: Tails. (Sorry, Eagles fans.)

Travis Kelce called tails. It never fails, as they say.

The Chiefs won the coin toss, in a bad omen for the Eagles.

In Philly’s past Super Bowl appearances, when the coin toss result was tails, they lost.

Trump visits field before heading to suite

Trump spent a few minutes on the field before he headed to his suite to watch the game with lawmakers and family members.

After entering through a tunnel near the Chiefs’ end of the field, he greeted first responders and victims of the New Year’s Day attack in the French Quarter.

He was greeted with a mix of cheers and boos from fans.

Batiste brings accents of New Orleans and a long last note to anthem

Jon Batiste sang the U.S. national anthem while playing a wildly multicolored piano. He started out soft and only sprinkled only a few accents from his native New Orleans but got increasingly jazzy as he went, holding and riffing on the last note for a long time.

The telecast cut to a saluting President Donald Trump during the performance. The 2 minutes, 2 seconds the seven-time Grammy winner took to sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” was about average for a Super Bowl anthem.

It was the exact same length as Chris Stapleton two years ago but a lot slower than Reba McEntire, who brought it in at 1:30 last year.

Eli declared victorious over Peyton in ‘Kick of Destiny’

Eli Manning was declared victorious over his brother Peyton in FanDuel’s third annual “Kick of Destiny,” a pregame promotion from the gambling site held hours before Super Bowl kickoff on Sunday.

That means fans who betted for Team Eli are set to win a share of $10,000,000 in FanDuel Bonus Bets.

A very Louisiana ‘America the Beautiful’

Trombone Shorty, left, and Lauren Daigle, center, perform “America The Beautiful” before the NFL Super Bowl 59 football game between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles, Sunday, Feb. 9, 2025, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

Trombone Shorty and Lauren Daigle added some serious Big Easy swing to their rendition of “America the Beautiful.”

Shorty played his signature instrument during the verses and then sang along with Daigle on the choruses.

The last word from Mahomes, Barkley

Patrick Mahomes and Saquon Barkley met with Fox reporters Erin Andrews and Tom Rinaldi after the teams took the field for the Super Bowl.

Said Mahomes: “Just enjoying it with the team. It’s always special.”

Added Barkley: “It’s no accident why we’re here. … It’s go time.”

It’s a pro-Eagles crowd at the Super Bowl

There was a heavily pro-Eagles crowd inside the Superdome to watch Philadelphia try to dethrone the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Chiefs.

The Chiefs were booed loudly during pregame introductions, and the crowed revved up when Bradley Cooper appeared with a mic to introduce Philadelphia.

It had been evident all week that Eagles fans had come in droves, while perhaps a bit of Super Bowl fatigue had set in among Kansas City fans, who thought the big game was a once-in-a-lifetime trip but has now happened three straight years.

It’s a good bet that a lot of otherwise neutral fans were rooting for the Eagles, too. The Chiefs have become the juggernaut that everybody loves to hate.

Celebrities are ready for kickoff, too

Paul McCartney is here. Messi in a white sweatsuit. Bradley Cooper is on the field in his green Eagles jacket. Taylor Swift is in a suite with Ice Spice. Jay-Z with his daughters Blue Ivy and Rumi were on the field earlier.

Harry Connick Jr. welcomes the crowd — and the world — to the Super Bowl

New Orleans legend Harry Connick Jr. has welcomed the crowd, and the worldwide television audience, to the Super Bowl.

With live marching bands, dancing and song, Connick led a Mardi Gras-themed welcome.

“How y’all feeling, baby? Let’s celebrate some New Orleans music and culture at Super Bowl 59,” Connick said as the performance was beginning.

Lady Gaga, Tom Brady honor Americans’ resilience to tragedy

Lady Gaga sang “Hold My Hand,” her 2022 tribute to resilience, in a pre-recorded performance on Bourbon Street that was aired in the run-up to kickoff.

Before the song, a solemn group that included Tom Brady, Michael Strahan and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell walked up the street together to honor the victims of recent tragedies including the Jan. 1 New Orleans truck attack and recent Los Angeles wildfires.

Brady praised “the American spirit of courage, generosity and unity.”

Gaga wore all white and sat at a piano in the middle of the street in the performance that was taped at 4 a.m. on Thursday.

Inside the Superdome, fans were given bracelets that lit up in an otherwise darkened stadium, creating a twinkling nighttime effect.

Lauren Daigle embraces hometown pride ahead of Super Bowl pregame performance

When Trombone Shorty invited Daigle months ago to join him for “America the Beautiful” at the Super Bowl, she didn’t hesitate. Now, as she prepares to take the stage, she calls the moment an honor — one that carries deep meaning in her home state of Louisiana.

“There’s a sense of pride in the air. It’s palpable,” said Daigle, a two-time Grammy winner known for her 2018 breakout hit “You Say.” She sees the NFL’s presence as a much-needed uplift for New Orleans, a city still healing from the New Year’s terrorist attack and past hardships like Hurricane Katrina.

Daigle and Trombone Shorty began rehearsals at the Superdome on Friday after first working on the song together in the studio.

As for pre-show jitters? She welcomes them.”Nerves are part of the experience,” she said. “You just have to let them fly.”

The futbol GOAT has arrived at football’s biggest game

Lionel Messi is at the Super Bowl, an intersection of futbol and football.

The eight-time Ballon d’Or winner as soccer’s best player is at the Superdome, arriving one day after he and Inter Miami played a preseason game at Honduras.

Messi is the reigning MLS MVP.

NBA and NHL clear schedules, but 76ers will be airborne for Super Bowl’s start

The NBA and NHL had games today, but all were scheduled early enough to be done before the start of the Super Bowl.

That said, one team probably isn’t very happy right now.

The Philadelphia 76ers played at Milwaukee — and the team was flying back to Philly after the game, with a flight plan that has them airborne during kickoff.

It’s about a 90-minute flight between Milwaukee and Philly, and the 76ers are scheduled to land around 7:30 p.m. That would be roughly the end of the first quarter.

Dawn Staley’s supporting the Eagles

South Carolina women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley stayed true to her Philly roots.

Staley rocked a Super Bowl LIX sweatshirt and green sneakers when the Gamecocks played Sunday at Texas. Staley represents her favorite Philly teams as much as she can, and the city loves her back. In 2017, Philadelphia proclaimed a Dawn Staley Day and renamed a street right where she grew up as Dawn Staley Lane.

A 1,200-mile, 18-hour drive through the night

Philadelphia residents Ed White and Giiselle Burnett drove more than 1,200 miles overnight — an 18-hour drive — to arrive in Bourbon street in time for the Super Bowl.

Despite the overnight drive they were bursting with energy, dancing down the street blowing whistles and shouting cheers to other Eagles fans.

They had already adorned green Mardi Gras beads over their Eagles shirts.

“We got to come out here and represent for our birds,” White said. “Chiefs get outta here — it’s not happening!”

Ledisi keeps it local with a soaring ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’

Ledisi performs “Lift Every Voice and Sing” before the NFL Super Bowl 59 football game between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles, Sunday, Feb. 9, 2025, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez)

Ledisi was backed by a choir of local high school students as she sang “Lift Every Voice and Sing” — the song widely regarded as the Black national anthem.

The R&B singer stood spot-lit on a pedestal clad all in angelic white, with the students all in gold robes behind her as she delivered a soaring rendition of the song. It opened a series of pregame performances that will include the U.S. national anthem sung by Jon Batiste.

Chiefs heard loud boos

Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs heard loud boos as they ran on the field for warmups. The early-arriving crowd was overwhelmingly filled with Eagles fans. Though Philadelphians are known for their boorish behavior, the Eagles are fan favorites against the Chiefs. A few Saints fans were heard screaming “Go Birds!” and one Jets fan joined Eagles fans in singing “Fly! Eagles! Fly!” on the stadium concourse.

Taylor Swift arrives at the Super Bowl

Taylor Swift has arrived at the Super Bowl to cheer on her boyfriend Travis Kelce and the Chiefs.

The pop superstar was spotted in her suite at the Superdome, wearing a simple white ensemble, about an hour before kickoff.

Swift and Kelce have been the sports-and-entertainment power couple since early last season, when the four-time All-Pro tight end invited the 14-time Grammy winner to watch him play in a matchup with the Bears.

Swift made an around-the-world trip from her concert in Tokyo to Las Vegas last year to watch the Chiefs beat the 49ers in the Super Bowl.

Super Bowl ads hit record price, cost up to $8M

The cost of a 30-second ad during the Super Bowl reportedly cost up to a record $8 million this year; and that’s just the media buy — production can cost millions more.

Why spend so much? The Super Bowl reaches more than 120 million viewers who tune in not only to watch the game, but are primed to watch the ads as well.

An estimated 123.7 million viewers tuned in for Super Bowl in 2024, according to Nielsen. By contrast, about 19.5 million people tuned in to the Oscars in 2024 and about 18.6 million watched the final game of the World Series in October, according to Nielsen.

Fans pay their respects to truck attack victims

At the entrance to Bourbon Street, many paused to pay their respects to the 14 people had lost their lives in the Jan. 1 truck attack.

A group of young Eagles fans removed green beads from around their necks and placed them on the memorial beside a mass of flowers and other offerings from tourists and locals alike.

“I’ve seen it on the news but it’s my first time seeing it in person,” said Baton Rouge resident Chester Matthews, 35, as he stood beside the memorial, taking it in. “People lost their lives on the same streets we’re walking on. I just had to take a moment to reflect on that.”

A vast roster of Super Bowl ads

Famous mustaches help deliver Pringles. Bad Bunny is all smiles in Ritz’s “salty club.” And Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal’s “When Harry Met Sally” characters reunite in Katz’s Deli, with the help of Hellmann’s mayonnaise.

It’s Super Bowl Sunday — and, as always, there’s a vast roster of advertisers ready to vie for fans’ attention during game breaks.

The commercials will pull out all the stops. Viewers can expect to see the biggest actors, dazzling special effects and plenty of nostalgia (coupled with a frenzied mix of silliness) fill their screen.