Patrick Mahomes, Tyrann Mathieu discuss pain of Super Bowl loss

Two years ago at this time, the K.C. Chiefs were facing down the demons of a missed opportunity, a team that was only an offsides call away from a Super Bowl appearance. It was a long offseason asking “what might have been?” after coming so close to the ultimate goal.

This year, the offseason is long once again, as the Chiefs are reeling from another tough loss. Only this time, the frustration isn’t over a close call but rather a sizable beating at the hands of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. After winning their first Super Bowl in 50 seasons, the Chiefs attempted to “run it back” and enjoyed a banner season of 14 wins in the regular season and another championship appearance.. However, the sting of a 31-9 loss hasn’t gone away for Chiefs players even a few months after the fact.

On Monday, two of the Chiefs biggest stars—quarterback Patrick Mahomes and safety Tyrann Mathieu—spoke to reporters for the first time in a few weeks and made it clear that the Super Bowl loss hangs heavy on each of them. No one wants to get bogged down in past failures, but it’s clear that both leaders are wanting themselves and their teammates to learn from it and get better.

“I think you have to take it back to the first year I started,” said Mahomes of the 2018 season. “We lost to the Patriots in the AFC Championship game. You have to let that stuff motivate you to get better each and every day. You look back at that and we were able to find a way to flip a switch and make ourselves better and make a run at the Super Bowl the next year. You have to try to have that same mentality knowing that we’ve been there two years in a row now. We’ve won one, we’ve lost one. We’ve gotta find a way to get back and try to win it.”

For Mathieu, he’s allowed himself to process the loss several times over as he admitted to reporters that he’s watched the game “four or five times.” He says, “Every time I watch it, it hurst a little bit more.” However, he’s gleaned what he can from it to motivate him and then move on, saying he doesn’t want this Chiefs team to be “derailed” by it.

“For me, it’s all about staying on top of my guys. I think losses like that can derail certain teams. For us, we need to put it behind us to learn from it, but I think it will be one of those games that can build us going forward. … I really had to disconnect for a moment. It was a long season, not just for football players but for the whole world. To have that time away from the game to reflect on life and family and then come back to it, I think it’s given me a new motivating factor. I think I have more things to accomplish and not just me personally but the team. That’s really my mindset right now.”

As long as the Chiefs are learning and not just lamenting, they should be okay. They’ve been to the top and they’ve been let down. They know what it takes to get there through any number of circumstances and no one should allow the sting of a loss in the Super Bowl to also take away what they were able to accomplish—to actually get back there again, to win 14 regular season games, to handle the best that each team could bring each week. They’ve got the leaders to do it all again.