What. A. Game. It was the two teams no one wanted to see and a total snoozefest in the first half, but Super Bowl LVIII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers turned into arguably one of the best Super Bowls ever.

I know I’m a bit late to the Super Bowl takes party, but I needed a few days to collect my thoughts after staying up until 4 a.m. watching the U.K. broadcast. For some reason, the broadcast had Maurice Jones-Drew as the play-by-play commentator — who wasn’t the greatest — and, instead of showing commercials, would cut to a table of five pundits talking about the game as if it was an Aston Villa versus Bournemouth Premier League game.

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But the game itself was as exciting as ever, and as I correctly predicted and “hoped,” the Chiefs came out on top, 25-22, in overtime. With that result came lots of discourse about what transpired. Lots of talk about how the NFL is scripted (tell that to Dre Greenlaw), how it’s so awful that the Chiefs won again (cry about it) and how Joe Biden posted the scariest Super Bowl celebratory post from a president I’ve ever seen (don’t mean to get political, it was just very off-putting).

While all of those are well and good, here are a few of the thought-out opinions I have about the big game.

You’re overreacting to the 49ers’ coin toss decision

One of the biggest talking points at the end of the game was Head Coach Kyle Shanahan’s choice to receive the ball first in overtime with the new rules in place. The 49ers got the ball first and kicked a field goal, which left the Chiefs needing just a touchdown to win the game, which is exactly what they did.

The choice came under even heavier fire after reports came out that some 49ers players — most notably fullback Kyle Juszczyk — weren’t aware of the new overtime rules changes, while the Chiefs had a detailed plan for what they would do if overtime were to happen.

Of course, the Chiefs are going to have a detailed plan over the new overtime rules; they’re literally the reason they’re in place. The rule came into effect in the playoffs because of the Chiefs’ game with the Bills in 2022; it makes sense they paid extra attention to it. And no offense to Kyle Juszczyk, but it doesn’t matter if the fullback — or any other player for that matter — knows the rules, only the head coach and the captain who are there for the coin toss. 

I think Shanahan was getting too much heat for it. It was the first-ever overtime playoff game with the new rules; precedents hadn’t yet been set for the smart choice. I get it makes more sense to go second, because you know what you have to beat, and it’s always four-down territory. But the defense was tired after being on the field for nearly two minutes in a no-huddle situation, and Shanahan wanted to give them a rest. 

His thought process was: He would be able to get the ball third and have a definitive chance to win with any score. If you want to give him heat for any decision in overtime, it should be for kicking a field goal when it was fourth and four at the Chiefs’ 9-yard line instead of going for the touchdown, not for choosing to want the ball first.

Patrick Mahomes will finish his career as the GOAT

I am hesitant to say this, mainly because, as of late, the instant I make a prediction in this column, the opposite almost immediately happens. But man, Mahomes is incredible. Now I get it: People compliment him too much, and it has gotten out of hand, but it’s all warranted. He was leading that last drive of regulation himself in the no-huddle offense. Andy Reid gave Mahomes the reins, and he worked his magic to come back from yet another double-digit deficit.

With this win, Mahomes separated himself from every other quarterback in the league today. The distance between Mahomes and the second-best quarterback in the league right now is far larger than the gap between the second-best quarterback and the fifth-best quarterback.

As a long-time Tom Brady hater, it’s annoying seeing the same player win over and over again. But winning three Super Bowls in four years is another level of greatness. He’s done it all so far; he has the stats, the signature performances and the hardware. Now, he just needs the longevity Brady had, which is no easy feat. But if he can win even a few more Super Bowls in the next 12 years, he’ll surpass that guy from New England by a mile.

I hate Mecole Hardman

This one hurt the most. Mecole Hardman was the hero in the end for catching the game-winning touchdown in overtime. He was also the guy the New York Jets — unfortunately, my beloved team — took away from the Chiefs by giving him $4 million in the offseason. He then proceeded to be so bad that the Jets traded him right back to the Chiefs midway through the year.

Maybe it was the Jets’ coaching staff’s fault and not Hardman’s, but I’m going to choose to blame Hardman. He claimed he blacked out and didn’t even realize he had scored the touchdown to seal the deal. Yeah, right. You’re telling me you were in the most important game of your life, and you didn’t realize that you had just won the game in overtime. Give me a break. Am I salty that he caught as many passes on that final play as he did his entire career with the Jets, and is that mainly why I am very upset? Potentially.

Stefano Fendrich is a junior writing about his opinions on some of sports’ biggest debates in his column, “The Great Debate,” which runs every other Wednesday.