Truemors
Super Bowl XLIII will be the forty-third edition of the Super Bowl, an American football game that will feature the American Football Conference champion Pittsburgh Steelers (14-4) and the National Football Conference champion Arizona Cardinals (12-7) to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for the 2008 season. Of historical note is that this game matches up two franchises that were merged into a single team (i.e., “Card-Pitt”) for the 1944 season, in response to the depleted rosters during World War II. Pittsburgh will be going for its sixth Super Bowl win, which would place it in sole possession of the record for most Super Bowl wins, while the Cardinals are seeking their first league title since 1947 and only the second undisputed league championship in their history.
The Cardinals will be the designated "home team", as is the case for all NFC champions in odd numbered Super Bowls. Arizona will wear their red jerseys--the team has predominantly worn red at home since moving into University of Phoenix Stadium in 2006 after predominantly wearing their white jerseys at home for their first 18 years in Arizona to combat the heat--while the Steelers will wear white jerseys for the second consecutive Super Bowl.[1] Entering the game, Pittsburgh is 2-0 lifetime wearing white jerseys in the Super Bowl, wearing them as the "visiting team" against the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IX and against the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XL despite being the "home team" that season due to the team's road success in the playoffs and the team consistently wearing their black jerseys in home games. In addition, teams wearing white jerseys in the Super Bowl are on a four-game winning streak entering Super Bowl XLIII, dating back to Super Bowl XXXIX.
The game is scheduled to be played on February 1, 2009,[2] with kickoff at 6:20 PM Eastern Time (23:20 GMT), at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida. Super Bowl XLIII will be the second Super Bowl at this venue and the fourth overall in that city. Tampa was selected for the game site on May 25, 2005, beating out three other finalists: Atlanta, Houston, and Miami. It is the third Super Bowl in history to feature two pre-expansion era (pre 1960) teams, joining Super Bowl XIV (Steelers vs. Los Angeles Rams) and Super Bowl XLI (Indianapolis Colts vs. Chicago Bears).
The Super Bowl XLIII logo features an abstract representation of a football stadium, with blue and green colors representing the regional waterways and landscapes of Tampa Bay. Eight yards of playing field are shown, alluding to the game's status as the championship of the 2008 NFL season. In a tradition starting with the Super Bowl XL logo, two stars — one red, representing the AFC, and one blue, representing the NFC — are flanked on either side of the Super Bowl XLIII logo.[3] The tagline for Super Bowl XLIII as well as the 2008 NFL season is "Believe In Now".[4]
The NFL will salute four decades of champions during the coin toss ceremony and the Vince Lombardi Trophy presentation. The coin toss will feature Roger Craig (Super Bowl XXIII, 1989), John Elway (Super Bowl XXXIII, 1999) and Lynn Swann (Super Bowl XIII, 1979). Roger Craig follows last year's participants and fellow San Francisco 49ers Craig Walsh (son of Bill Walsh), Ronnie Lott, Jerry Rice and Steve Young. Joe Namath (Super Bowl III, 1969) will participate in the Vince Lombardi Trophy presentation and he previously participated in the coin toss in Super Bowl XXVIII. - wikipedia.org
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