Super Bowl XL was an American football game between the National Football Conference (NFC) champion Seattle Seahawks and the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Pittsburgh Steelers to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for the 2005 season. The Steelers defeated the Seahawks by the score of 21–10. The game was played on February 5, 2006, at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan.
With the win, the Steelers joined the San Francisco 49ers and the Dallas Cowboys as the only franchises to have won five Super Bowls. Pittsburgh, who finished the regular season with an 11–5 record, also became the fourth wild card team, the third in nine years, and the first ever #6 seed in the NFL playoffs, to win a Super Bowl. The Seahawks, on the other hand, were making their first ever Super Bowl appearance after posting an NFC-best 13–3 regular season record.
The Steelers jumped to a 14–3 lead early in the third quarter with running back Willie Parker's Super Bowl record 75-yard touchdown run. Seahawks defensive back Kelly Herndon's Super Bowl record 76-yard interception return set up a Seattle touchdown to cut the lead 14–10. But Pittsburgh responded with Antwaan Randle El's 43-yard touchdown pass to Hines Ward, the first time a wide receiver threw a touchdown pass in a Super Bowl, to clinch the game in the fourth quarter. Ward, who caught 5 passes for 123 yards and a touchdown, while also rushing for 18 yards, was named Super Bowl MVP.
Read more about Super Bowl XL: Background, Game Summary, Starting Lineups, Officials, Commercials, Gambling, Ring
Famous quotes containing the word bowl:
“In a bowl to sea went wise men three,
On a brilliant night of June:
They carried a net, and their hearts were set
On fishing up the moon.”
—Thomas Love Peacock (1785–1866)