How To Win The Super Bowl With Chess Knowledge

Two teams face off in the Super Bowl. Will the winning team be the one that has better chess knowledge? Here’s why chess knowledge may give one team an edge:

• Control The Center In Chess and Super Bowl
• Intermezzo In Chess And Football
• Tactics In Chess And Super Bowl
• Blitz In Chess And Football
• Octopus In Chess And Super Bowl

Control The Center In Chess and Super Bowl

If you control the center, you have an advantage in chess and football. In chess, the player who controls the center usually has more options and can dominate the game. Ways to control the center include occupying it with pawns, moving pieces to control central squares, and neutralizing or chasing away enemy pieces. The Chess.com lesson “Control The Center” says to “put your pieces in the ideal location to control the most important part of the board—the center.” (Take the five challenges in this lesson.)

Similarly, in football, the team that controls the center may be the one who takes the trophy. Consider the advantage that the Philadelphia Eagles have. Its offensive line is huge. As The Wall Street Journal headlined, “The Super Bowl has never seen anything like these five gigantic humans.” On average, the five starting linemen stand at 6-foot-6 and weigh 338 pounds.

By comparison with their counterparts on the Kansas City Chiefs, they are more than an inch taller and 26 pounds heavier. In fact, Philadelphia’s starters make up the tallest and heaviest offensive line in Super Bowl history. On average, the Eagles are eight pounds heavier than any other offensive line in Super Bowl history. Mekhi Becton (the 6-foot-7, 363-pound right guard) says, “The main goal is to just dominate the people in front of us.”

The main goal is to just dominate the people in front of us.
—Mekhi Becton, right guard of Philadelphia Eagles

Intermezzo In Chess And Football

Yes, an intermezzo is important in both chess and football, although you may not hear the word intermezzo on the broadcast. First, in chess, we generally know that an intermezzo is an "in-between move" or an unexpected move that poses a severe threat and forces an immediate response.

Many famous games have beautiful intermezzo moves such as the game in 1911 between Jose Raul Capablanca and Aron Nimzowitsch. Nimzowitsch’s bishop captured his opponent’s knight, and Nimzowitsch expected Capablanca to take the capturing bishop as the next move to maintain material equality. However, Capablanca responded instead with an in-between move that brought an inescapable threat of checkmate.

For a more recent example of a game where an intermezzo was critical, see the third-round report of the Chennai Grand Masters 2023.

Are there “in-between moves” in football? Consider the flea flicker where the quarterback hands off the ball to a running back who then throws it back to the quarterback. Then the quarterback throws the ball to a receiver. The Eagles have used this play before in a Super Bowl. Nick Foles threw a flea flicker to Torrey Smith for a 41-yard touchdown. The play was a turning point in the game and helped the Eagles defeat the Minnesota Vikings 38–7 in 2018. (Click here for a video of the flea flicker that cannot be embedded because of NFL restrictions.)

Tactics In Chess And Super Bowl

Tactics are clearly important in chess and the Super Bowl. In chess, tactics occur when a player makes a maneuver that seizes immediate opportunities, such as material gain or checkmate. These moves must be forcing so the other player cannot escape them. Well-known tactics include pins, skewers, forks, and discovered attacks.

In football, tactics are important for controlling the game and maximizing a team’s strengths. On offense, tactics can include using different formations to confuse the defense, using short, quick passes to break down defenses, overloading to create superiority and break defensive lines, using a no-huddle offense to limit substitutions, as well as faking a run to trick the defense before the ball is thrown. Defense tactics include blitzing to pressure the quarterback and disguising the coverage and switching at the snap to confuse the quarterback. Tactics are also important for special teams such as on-side kicks as well as fake punts and field goals.

Blitz In Chess And Football

Although a tactic in football, blitz deserves special mention because of its relevance to both football and chess. During the Super Bowl, expect each team to blitz as they increase the number of defensive players rushing the quarterback to force a mistake, such as a sack, fumble, or interception.

In chess, blitz is not a tactic but is related to the rush that occurs in football. It simply refers to a game of chess that has a fast time control and on Chess.com is between three and five minutes per player. Blitz is the most popular time control on Chess.com, and more than 3.5 million blitz games played each day.

Octopus In Chess And Super Bowl

An octopus with eight tentacles that can fight in as many directions. In chess, it’s easy to associate the term octopus with a knight. What other piece can land in eight different directions? A strongly positioned knight in enemy territory is often referred to as an octopus. When centrally placed, the knight can reach out to eight squares. For more information about an octopus knight, see “How An Octopus Knight Can Crush Defenses, Win Chess Games.”

The Super Bowl is one of the most significant betting events of the year, and the term octopus may lead to a financial reward for wagering fans. For the Super Bowl, octopus refers to a specific novelty bet that typically becomes available only for the Super Bowl. An octopus wager is a bet that a player will score a touchdown and then will immediately score a two-point conversion. (A touchdown is worth six points; add another two and you get eight.) The bet is offered as a “yes or no” option. A site on X/Twitter even reports after successful two-point conversions if there is an octopus.

In the 2023 Super Bowl, Eagles’ quarterback Jalen Hurts actually scored an octopus. In in the fourth quarter, Philadelphia trailed the Chiefs 35-27 when Hurts scored on a two-yard touchdown run with 5:15 left. He then rushed for the two-point conversion to tie the game at 35. Will we see an octopus in Super Bowl LIX? Meanwhile, here’s the two-point conversion in 2023 (which also cannot be embedded because of NFL restrictions).

Mahomes: "It's Going To Be A Chess Match"

Expect to hear a chess reference occasionally during the Super Bowl LIX broadcast. In the broadcast of the Chiefs-Bills game that determined the American Football Conference champion, commentator Tony Romo said that the duel between quarterbacks Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen was “a chess match.” In comments to CBS Sports, Mahomes also used the chess analogy and called Super Bowl LIX "a chess match." The broadcasters and players again may turn to chess to explain what is happening on the field. 

When Super Bowl LIX is played, impress your family and friends with your knowledge of chess. You might even help them to understand the game. Kickoff is on Sunday, Feb. 9, at 6:30 p.m. ET and on Monday, Feb. 10, at 00:30 CET / 5:00 a.m. IST.

For a related topic about chess and the Super Bowl, see "Why Super Bowl Quarterback Joe Burrow Plays Chess."

What do you think? Have you heard more references to chess recently during football broadcasts?