The NFL has added a Monday Night game to their 2021 Super Wild Card Weekend schedule, the league has officially announced.
The NFL expanded the playoffs last season, adding a third Wild Card team in each conference to bring the total playoff field to 14 teams. That expansion resulted in three Wild Card games on Saturday and Sunday.
For the 2021 season, Super Wild Card Weekend will now feature two games on Saturday, three games on Sunday, and one game on Monday night. Games on Saturday will kickoff at 4:35pm and 8:15pm ET, games on Sunday at 1:05pm, 4:40pm, and 8:15pm ET), with the lone game on Monday at 8:15pm ET.
Specific networks for each Super Wild Card Weekend game in 2021 have not been assigned, but CBS and NBC will both broadcast two games while FOX and ESPN/ABC will each broadcast one. The network that will broadcast the Monday Night Wild Card game will be announced at a later date.
The 2020 playoff expansion ensured that two additional Wild Card teams – one each in the American and National Football Conferences – qualify for the playoffs. The No. 1 seed in each conference will receive a bye in the Wild Card round. The remaining division champions in each conference will be seeded 2, 3, and 4 by record, followed by the next three teams per conference with the best records seeded 5, 6, and 7.
AFC and NFC Wild Card games will feature the 2 seed hosting the 7 seed, the 3 seed hosting the 6 seed and the 4 seed hosting the 5 seed.
The NFL Playoff Schedule is slated to begin on Saturday, Jan. 15, 2022. Divisional Round games are scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 22 and Sunday, Jan. 23, while the AFC and NFC Championship games will be played on Sunday, Jan. 30.
Super Bowl LVI is scheduled for Sunday, February 13, 2022 and the game will be played at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif.
NFL Schedules
- NFL Schedule (Composite)
- NFL Team Schedules
- NFL Playoff Schedule
This sounds stupid. First they expand the playoffs to 14 teams, which is 1 or 2 too many, then they expand the season to 17 games, which is 1 too many. Now, playoff games on weekdays?! I hope whoever makes the playoff schedule makes it so that the winner of this game plays on Sunday the next week.
There is nothing wrong with having a Saturday triple-header
They expanded to 14 teams from 12, not to 16. Seven from each conference make it now where before was only six.
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And a Monday night game is cool as long as the winner is guaranteed a Sunday game the next weekend for division playoffs.
Kevin Kelley: Where do you get 16 playoff teams? The article appears to discuss only 14 payoff teams.
Just an oversight. There was a contingency to have 16 teams last season due to COVID, guess that was in my head.