As fans of the Green Bay Packers and 29 other teams plan to watch a Super Bowl that does not involve their team this weekend, a lot of the pregame hype centers on the Kansas City Chiefs and how they are on the brink of a historic achievement.
Through the first 58 Super Bowl contests, no team has won three such games consecutively. There have been several instances of teams going back-to-back for league supremacy; in all that feat has been accomplished nine times since the 1966 season when the Super Bowl debuted. The last of the nine is a current streak, as the Chiefs claimed the 2023 and 2024 Lombardi trophies. This Sunday, they look to become immortalized as the first team to “three-peat” as Super Bowl champs.
However, the only team to win three consecutive championships in the history of the NFL closed out what many thought to be one of the greatest sports dynasties ever, and the last two titles were actually claimed with Super Bowl victories.
The Green Bay Packers first won three consecutive NFL titles in 1929-1931. In those years, legendary coach Curly Lambeau led the Pack to those championships, the first three of five for which he was responsible.
Critics, however, balk at the authenticity of these “championships.” In those years, NFL champions were determined by their record throughout the regular season. It was not until 1933 that an NFL Championship game was played to culminate a season.
Those squads boasted several Hall of Famers, a list that, in addition to Lambeau, includes Johnny “Blood” McNally, Arnie Herber, Cal Hubbard, and Mike Michalske.
After that, it took 28 years for the groundwork to be laid for the Packers’ next run at three in a row.
On Jan. 28, 1959, the course of the Green Bay Packers and the NFL changed direction. They were set towards sights never seen previously in Wisconsin or the rest of the American football landscape. That day, Vince Lombardi was lured from his offensive coordinator job with the New York Giants and hired by the Packers to be their head coach.
The progression Lombardi’s teams enjoyed started from that first season in 1959. After winning just one game in 1958, the Packers finished with a winning record for the first time since 1947. The following season saw Green Bay vie for a league championship, only to fall short, losing 17-13 to the Philadelphia Eagles in the 1960 title game.
Famously, Lombardi pledged that the loss to the Eagles would be the last time one of his teams lost in the playoffs. He was right.
After dispatching the Giants in both the 1961 and 1962 championship games, Lombardi was hungry for a third in a row. Unfortunately, injuries and a year-long suspension of star halfback Paul Hornung derailed the Packers, and they did not make the playoffs in 1963 for the chance for the three-peat.
Patiently, Lombardi and the Packers waited a couple of more seasons for the chance at history.
Following a disappointing 1964 season in which the Packers limped to an 8-5-1 record, Green Bay had high hopes for the 1965 campaign. The Packers regained their playoff position by winning 10 games. They beat the Baltimore Colts 13-10 in the Western Division championship. This victory advanced them to the 1965 title tilt against the Cleveland Browns.
For the 1966 season, the NFL season would consist of one more game to determine the ultimate champion. The NFL title game was no longer the final showdown. The winner of that contest would now face the victors of the AFL to decide the conclusive conquering squad. Following their 12-2 regular season, the Packers traveled to Texas and defeated the Dallas Cowboys for the NFL crown. They then set off for Los Angeles and Super Bowl I to challenge the AFL-best Chiefs.
On Jan. 2, 1966, on a muddy Lambeau Field surface, the Packers welcomed the Browns for NFL dominance. After spotting Cleveland a 9-7 lead after the first quarter, Green Bay outscored the Browns 16-3 the rest of the way to win, 23-12, for their first title since 1962.
That first Super Bowl was still in its experimental stages; the game only filled two-thirds of the Los Angeles Coliseum’s seats. Despite that, the Packers rolled Kansas City 35-10, and the dream of winning the elusive third consecutive championship was alive and well in 1967.
Green Bay staggered through the regular season in 1967, finishing with a pedestrian 9-4-1 record. But, that was good enough to earn a playoff spot and the right to defend their two previous championships.
The Packers hammered the Los Angeles Rams in their first-round game, 28-7. This earned Green Bay a second-straight NFL Championship game against the Cowboys. Unlike the 1966 title game, this was to be held in Green Bay on New Year’s Eve.
Playing in the coldest NFL game on record, Bart Starr’s quarterback sneak with 16 seconds to go clinched a 21-17 Packers win in the now famous “Ice Bowl.” But yet again, Green Bay’s season was not over.
The drive for three straight titles became the sole focus of the 1967 season. According to a writer close to those teams in the 1960s, he became downright fixated on achieving this feat.
“Vince (Lombardi) was obsessed with winning three in a row,” said Bud Lea, former sports editor for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, in 2006. “The Packers didn’t do it in ’63 with (Paul) Hornung being suspended. Winning the championship in 1965 was the first of the three.”
On Jan. 14, 1968, the Packers met the Oakland Raiders in Miami’s Orange Bowl to determine Super Bowl II. As far as the actual game went, the competitive balance was never in doubt; Green Bay dominated the Raiders and won convincingly, 33-14.
Rumors swirled around Green Bay that this may be Lombardi’s final game on the Packers sideline. With that as an incentive, Packers players knew they wanted to give their revered coach one last day in the sun.
In the locker room at halftime, guard Jerry Kramer spoke up to his teammates.
In an interview given after Super Bowl II, Kramer said: “We had all been pretty aware of the fact that coach Lombardi was thinking very, very seriously about retirement. We all felt that this was going to be his last game, and I said to the fellas (at halftime), ‘Look, we’ve got 30 more minutes this year, let’s give it to the old man.’ That’s about all I said.”
Thus, the Packers earned their third consecutive title, a feat that has not happened since.
The respect Kramer felt for Lombardi oozed in a famous photo of the player carrying the mentor off the field following the game, a snapshot that needed no caption:
Yes, the Chiefs have the chance to be the first team ever to win three straight Super Bowls. Should it happen, that accomplishment would be historic and deserving of its accolades.
The three-year run by the Green Bay Packers should be hailed. It deserves celebration for the greatness it showed. It inspired wonderful memories. If nothing else, we hope this year’s game will create fond memories. It will remind us of who the championship trophy is named after and why.
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