“My whole family came down from Sacramento, we were all pumped, there was partying and the second they lost, my uncle got up, ran outside and just started screaming ‘NO!’ at the top of his lungs,” Aragon senior Edgar Miranda tells as he recollects his family’s Super Bowl tradition.
The Super Bowl is the national championship for the National Football League (NFL) which pins the top two teams against each other in a “winner-takes-it-all,” three hour event.
Super Bowl 50 took place on Sunday, Feb. 7 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California. The Denver Broncos beat the Carolina Panthers with a final score of 24-10. The quarterback for the Broncos, Peyton Manning, went 13 for 23 and threw for only 141 yards. Manning played as the oldest quarterback in NFL history to start in the Super Bowl, and with the Super Bowl win, he became the first quarterback in NFL history to win 200 games as a starter (stampedeblue.com).
Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara was completed in 2014 and successfully filled over 70,000 attendees on Super Bowl Sunday. The city of Santa Clara, as well as the businesses there, expected an influx of tourists from around the country. Santa Clara listed the top 50 things to do in the City of Santa Clara on their website, which included a wide array of restaurants, museums, trails and sports parks. Last year’s Super Bowl, which took place in Scottsdale, Arizona, brought the state of Arizona an estimated revenue of $719 million (azbigmedia.com).
The Super Bowl is enjoyed by a large portion of the American public. Because of the its entertaining advertisements, outrageous halftime show and football competition, the Super Bowl became one of the most viewed televised event in America. In 2015, a total of 168 million viewers tuned into watching the event (money.cnn.com). View count can vary throughout the years due to teams who are playing, performers at the halftime show, and media attention. The average view count for 2016’s Super Bowl 50 was a few million short of last year’s record with 111.9 million viewers (www.hollywoodreporter.com). A 30-second advertisement during the Super Bowl runs about 4.5 million US Dollars. The advertisements alone are such a big part of the event that there are awards and ratings made for the short commercials, such as USA Today’s Super Bowl Ad Meter.
However, due to the grandness of the event, there were some concerns caused by such crowded events being hosted in the Bay Area during the week of the Super Bowl.
Freshman Jessica Gutierrez says, “My favorite taqueria is in Santa Clara and there’s going to be a lot of traffic so I can’t go buy food.” Bay Area traffic is already rated to have the second-worst traffic in the United States by the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, and a sudden increase of tourists did not make traffic any less unrelenting.
Due to the “Super Bowl City” events that took place in San Francisco leading up to the game, public transit and travel time have also been heavily impacted.
Freshman Ben Nembhard faced transportation concerns as well, saying “I am supposed to meetup with some of my friends in the city, but now I can’t take BART anywhere.”
People in the Aragon community and people across the United States celebrate “Super Bowl Sunday” in a wide variety of ways. The day thus serves as a time to get together and celebrate with friends and family. Sophomore Mario Cruz Parada says, “[We] stayed home with my family, made nachos and liked to watch the game, scream, shout, and made bets.”
Junior Alex Tenorio adds, “I [spent] some time with my family and we [went] to a friends house and [brought] snacks and stuff like a potluck style and [watched] the game and all of that.”
A main aspect of entertainment at the Super Bowl stems from the halftime show. Beyonce performed at the Super Bowl, and her performance sparked controversy as she integrated a political message into it by referencing Black Lives Matter, Malcolm X, and Black Panthers.
Junior Dina Zheng says, “I felt like the political message gave Beyonce’s performance more impact and meaning, making it not just entertainment, but a powerful show with a significance.”
Junior Puneet Mahesha agrees, believing that the performance could reach a large audience with the Super Bowl, saying, “It was definitely appropriate [for Beyonce] to do so, and it was also a good idea since a lot of people were watching.”
With celebrities coming into the Bay Area for the event, San Francisco and Santa Clara gained media attention. Mashesha adds, “I feel that it shined a lot of light on the Bay Area and showed how great [our cities] are and how [the Bay Area is] a great place to host any event.”
Alongside the half time performances, Super Bowl commercials gained popularity among many viewers. Miranda says, “The commercials are also a treat.”
Whether people are football fanatics or not, there are a variety of perspectives that provide entertainment for everyone’s flavor. Whether someone watched the game to root for their favorite team, embrace a tradition, or enjoy clever commercials, the Super Bowl is more than a typical football game. It is also widely received as an American day of nachos, friends, family, and pride.
All in all, Senior Carter Walling concludes, “It’s not just for football fans, it’s a national spectacle.”
