Though Super Bowl Sunday is obviously king, perhaps the most exciting day of football of the year is conference championship Sunday. It's the last time we see real home field advantages of the season, and there's nothing quite like the emotion that comes from having crowds dedicated to one side or the other. The football tends to be great as well, as games are often decided by the slimmest of margins. The matchups this year? They're surely about as good as it gets.
NFL Conference Championship Opening Odds at BookMaker.eu
Packers ( 60 ) at Falcons ( -4 )
Steelers ( 50.5 ) at Patriots ( -6 )
Game Previews
Packers at Falcons – Sunday, 3:05 p.m. ET
The Falcons are going to get one last game at the old Georgia Dome before closing her up and moving next door to the new stadium opening in Atlanta in a few short months. It's no less than what the Dirty Birds deserve at this point for sure. They've been through a lot more this year than most would suspect, and beating though most of the betting public was on their side against Seattle, let's not forget that the difference between that game ultimately being played at the Georgia Dome or CenturyLink Field came down to Steven Hauschka blowing a chip shot of a kick against the Cardinals to take what should have been a win and turned it into a tie. And when the two teams were matched on the field for the second time this year, there was no doubt left as to who the superior club really was.
But are there going to be answers for the Packers? It's really hard to argue with what they're doing. They've won eight games in a row since starting at 4-6, and that includes beating three straight playoff teams in successive weeks. They're scoring at will, and they're doing so with a glut of injuries, including to Jordy Nelson, who sat out of last week's win in Dallas and basically all of the legitimate running backs on the roster.
Still, with basically a bunch of retreads around him on offense, Rodgers was masterful against Dallas, and we can only imagine what he's going to do against the Falcons in what should be a shootout. The total of 60 is the highest for a single game in the history of the NFL playoffs.
Steelers at Patriots – Sunday, 6:40 p.m. ET
Back in the middle of the season when the Steelers went up against the Patriots, they did so without Ben Roethlisberger under center. Landry Jones did the best that he could, but he was no match for the Pats that day in a 27-16 loss that probably wasn't as close as the final score indicated.
Now, Big Ben is back in the AFC Championship Game for the fifth time in his career, but he's got the company of Tom Brady once again. The Patriots have broken an NFL record now, playing in six straight conference title games, and it's hard to argue with anything they've done to get here. Has the schedule been incredibly weak for New England? Sure it has. After all, check out the list of starting quarterbacks that they've beaten this season.
Brock Osweiler
Matt Moore
Bryce Petty
Trevor Siemian
Joe Flacco
Jared Goff
Ryan Fitzpatrick
Colin Kaepernick
Tyrod Taylor
Landry Jones
Andy Dalton
Cody Kessler
Brock Osweiler
Ryan Tannehill
Carson Palmer
Yikes.
This spread opened up at just New England -4.5 before coming out on the mainstream lines at -6, insinuating that the Pats are only the better of these two teams by a small margin of a field goal, an interesting point considering the fact that they 14-3 ATS this season and have continually murdered big time spreads.
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