The NFL’s wild-card weekend may very well be particularly wild within the Sunshine State.
The Jacksonville Jaguars are the latest of the three Florida NFL franchises, holding their debut marketing campaign in 1995. Since then, the Jags have received 4 division titles, together with final season.
Jacksonville additionally captured division crowns throughout the 1998, 1999 and 2017 campaigns.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have been round since 1976 and have received their group eight occasions, sharing the dignity with the Jaguars in 1999 and 2022. Whereas the Miami Dolphins have been across the longest and have received 14 division titles, none of them got here when each Jacksonville and Tampa Bay had been additionally on high.
The Dolphins had 5 division crowns within the Nineteen Seventies alone and 5 extra within the Eighties throughout the Don Shula days, together with 4 straight from 1971-74 and 5 in a row from 1981-1985. Miami then completed first in 1992 and 1994 throughout the second half of Corridor of Fame quarterback Dan Marino’s profession.
Since then, the Dolphins have solely claimed first within the AFC East in 2000 and 2008.
Florida’s probability at historical past comes roughly six months after a brutal stretch of sports activities defeats on the very best levels for groups within the state.
In early April, each the Florida Atlantic Owls and Miami Hurricanes males’s basketball groups misplaced of their NCAA basketball match Closing 4 contests. Within the NBA and NHL respectively, the Miami Warmth and Florida Panthers misplaced to the Denver Nuggets and Vegas Golden Knights of their leagues’ championship rounds. Florida misplaced to LSU within the winner-take-all Recreation 3 of the lads’s Faculty World Sequence in late June.
Whereas asking for 3 particular NFL groups to win on a given day looks as if a tall process, every of the Buccaneers, Dolphins and Jaguars ought to have probability at victories in Week 18.
Each Jacksonville and Tampa Bay have highway video games on Sunday afternoon, however the contests are in opposition to two of the worst groups within the NFL, the Tennessee Titans and Carolina Panthers, respectively. Miami has a troublesome “Sunday Evening Soccer” battle with the Buffalo Payments on faucet, however they play at house. If the Dolphins can get a few of their key injured gamers like operating backs De’Von Achane and Raheem Mostert, in addition to wideout Jaylen Waddle on the sphere, they need to have shot at capturing their first division title in 15 years.
