"Super Bowl 48, in February of 2014, will be played in New York-New Jersey".
These are the words of Roger Goodell as he made the announcement just minutes ago. The glorious words which gave the New Meadowlands the right to host Super Bowl XLVIII.
Just after 2:45 PM EST, the owners assembled in a ballroom at the Omni Mandalay in Irving, Texas.
The goal? To choose a city to host Super Bowl XLVIII. The game will be held on February 2, 9, or 16 of 2014, and is predicated upon whether or not the NFL goes to an 18-game season by then.
The NY/NJ contingent was the favorite going into the meetings, as they haven’t hosted a championship game in just over 50 years. The competition was stiff, as they were pitted against two warm-weather cities that have hosted the big game a combination of 14 times.
But in the end, it was a NY/NJ state of mind, as the favorites rose to the top and secured the rights to host the big game.
As far as the vote goes, they did not win on the first go-around, or the second one for that matter. The rules state that if no city garners 75% of the votes, a second ballot is to be held and a re-vote is performed. After that, the city with the least votes (Miami/South Florida) was eliminated, and a head-to-head contest between Tampa and NY/NJ was held for the third ballot. Unfortunately, a 75% winner still was not reached, so it went to a fourth ballot, which was a 'simple majority' vote. The winner had to receive 17 of 32 votes. That winner was NY/NJ.
While we don't know the official vote counts, neither do the owners. Giants co-owner John Mara used to count the votes, but obviously this year it would have been a conflict of interest for him to perform that task.
This was a ground-breaking decision, as the NFL recently had a restriction stating that the host city must have an average temperature of 50 degrees in February to host a championship.
As the New York/New Jersey contingent celebrates by popping champagne, nothing is more appropriate than the slogan they used for their pitch:
"Make Some History" ----- Today, the NY/NJ contingent has done just that.