SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Now that the Seahawks are Super Bowl LX champions, attention immediately shifts to next year’s title game in Los Angeles, and organizers are looking to top Super Bowl LVI four years ago.
That prior game at SoFi Stadium capped the second year, and the first with fans in attendance, for the $5 billion facility that has been a major force in pushing NFL stadium design into a new generation. Since then, the Inglewood area surrounding the facility has seen the arrival of the Clippers’ Intuit Dome and the immersive Cosm facility, and a very different environment is expected compared to early 2022, when some pandemic protocols were still in place.
“We hadn’t had a Super Bowl then in 30 years, and you learn so much from going through that,” Rams president Kevin Demoff told Front Office Sports. “Now, Hollywood Park has grown and we can now do so much more to elevate the Super Bowl around the entire region.”
That expansive geographic footprint, in many respects, will resemble the sprawl seen this past week in the Bay Area for Super Bowl LX, that events stretch from downtown San Francisco to San Jose, roughly 50 miles away.
Media Handoff
As the game ended Sunday night, Disney-controlled ESPN began an elaborate handoff that includes special editions of NFL PrimeTime, SportsCenter, and Super Bowl Live on Sunday, and then several daytime shows on Monday broadcast from Main Street, U.S.A. at Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif. That setting, of course, overtly leans in to the theme park holdings that are core to Disney’s overall business.
Next year’s Super Bowl will be the first aired by ESPN, a landmark event in the network’s 46-year history, and will be further buttressed by the inclusion of the NFL assets.
There will also be a significant amount of additional synergy as ESPN will be taking over a facility adjacent to SoFi Stadium that houses NFL Network as part of the large-scale deal recently finalized between the league and the sports media giant.
Notably, Super Bowl LXI will be held on Valentine’s Day 2027, and will be followed the next day by the federal President’s Day holiday. That will help satisfy many fans and pundits who have called for the day after the Super Bowl to become a formal holiday.
Great Expectations
Super Bowl LXI will also be part of an expansive run of major events this decade in Los Angeles that also includes the past two World Series won by the Dodgers, next weekend’s NBA All-Star Game, World Cup matches this summer at SoFi Stadium, and the 2028 Summer Olympics.
“We’ve become an epicenter of the sports universe,” Demoff said. “SoFi Stadium, obviously, is at the heart of that, and what [Rams owner] Stan Kroenke envisioned years ago has now brought these major events back to Los Angeles.”
Demoff, for his part, would like next year’s game to end just as Super Bowl LVI did: a Rams victory over the Bengals that marked just the second time an NFL team won the Super Bowl at their home facility.
“I’ll take the same teams [as before],” Demoff said. “I plan for the Rams to win it again in our stadium, just as we did then.”
