AFC Championship Game
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The AFC Championship Game is one of the two semi-final matches of the National Football League, the largest professional American football league in the United States. The game is currently played on the penultimate Sunday in January and determines the champion of the American Football Conference. The winner receives the Lamar Hunt Trophy and advances to face the winner of the NFC Championship Game in the Super Bowl on the first Sunday in February. The current AFC Champions are the Indianapolis Colts.
It began in 1970 after the merger between the NFL and the American Football League. The AFC was formed by joining the 10 former AFL teams with 3 NFL teams: the then-Baltimore Colts, the Cleveland Browns, and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
[edit] Playoff structure
- For more details on this topic, see NFL playoffs.
At the end of each football season, a series of playoff games involving the top six teams in the AFC are conducted, consisting of the four division champions and two wild card teams. The two teams remaining play in the AFC Championship game.
Since the 1975-76 season, the site of the AFC Championship has been based on playoff seeding. The surviving club with the highest initial seeding in the playoffs hosts the game. A wild card team can not host the game unless both participants are wild cards. Prior to 1975-76, the site of the game was determined on a rotating basis.
[edit] Trivia
- Since the NFL-AFL merger, the Denver Broncos (1977, 1986, 1987, 1989, 1997, 1998) and Pittsburgh Steelers (1974, 1975, 1978, 1979, 1995, 2005) have won the most AFC Championships with 6. Including the AFL years, the Buffalo Bills have also won 6 Championships (1964, 1965, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993)
- Including the AFL years, the Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders have appeared in a record 13 AFL/AFC Championship Games. (3 in the AFL and 10 in the AFC). The Pittsburgh Steelers are tied with Oakland with 13 appearances. (All 13 appearances were after the AFL-NFL merger).
- The Oakland Raiders hold the record of appearing in the most consecutive AFC Championship Games with 5 appearances (1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977)
- Pittsburgh is the city that has hosted the most AFC Championship Games. The city has hosted the game on 9 separate occasions (1972, 1975, 1978, 1979, 1994, 1995, 1997, 2001, 2004)
- The attendance record for an AFC Championship Game was set in Los Angeles when the Los Angeles Raiders beat the Seattle Seahawks on January 8, 1984. The paid attendance was 91,445
- Including the AFL years, only two championship games have ever gone into overtime. (1962 - Dallas Texans vs. Houston Oilers, 1987 - Denver Broncos vs. Cleveland Browns)
- Including the AFL years, the record for most points scored by a winning team is 51. (1963 – San Diego Chargers vs. Boston Patriots, 1990 – Buffalo Bills vs. Los Angeles Raiders)
- The only current AFC team to have not appeared in an AFC Championship Game is the Houston Texans
- Four teams have never won an AFC Championship including the Cleveland Browns, Houston Texans, Kansas City Chiefs and the Jacksonville Jaguars.
- History was accomplished on Sunday, January 21, 2007 when two offensive lineman scored touchdowns. This was the first time in NFL Playoff history that this occurred. The first offensive lineman to score was New England Patriots guard Logan Mankins in the first quarter. The second offensive lineman to score was Indianapolis Colts center Jeff Saturday in the fourth quarter to tie the score at 28-28. This was also the first time an AFC championship game was played in a dome
- The winning team is rewarded with t-shirts and hats after the game that usually declare them "AFC Conference Champions", an example of a redundant acronym
[edit] Game history
See List of AFC Championship Game winners for the results of all past Championship Games.
