Stats behind Lions-49ers AFC Championship Game،
The Detroit Lions and San Francisco 49ers face off Sunday with a spot in Super Bowl LVIII on the line, but the franchises say they've been on different trajectories.
San Francisco is making its fourth appearance in the NFC Championship Game since 2019, while Detroit is in the playoffs for the first time since 2016. The Lions are one of four franchises to have never appeared in the Super Bowl since its debut in 1966, and the 49ers are seeking their third appearance this century.
The NFC Championship Game is a quarterback matchup between a No. 1 overall pick (Jared Goff) and the final pick of an NFL draft (Brock Purdy). Goff has lost all five of his starts against the 49ers since the start of the 2019 season, while Purdy has yet to face the Lions.
Here are more notable numbers behind the Lions-49ers NFC championship game.
ten: A key part of Detroit's resurgence has been Goff's performance. He will become the 10th quarterback to start in conference championship games with multiple franchises.
A win would make Goff just the fifth signal-caller to pitch a Super Bowl with multiple franchises — Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Kurt Warner and Craig Morton are the others. Only Brady and Manning have won two Super Bowls with two different franchises.
8: Similar to Goff, who reached the Super Bowl in his third season, Purdy played significant games early in his career.
He can become the eighth quarterback to start in the Super Bowl in his first or second NFL season, joining Dan Marino (1984), Warner (1999), Brady (2001), Ben Roethlisberger (2005), Colin Kaepernick (2012). , Russell. Wilson (2013) and Joe Burrow (2021).
The previous seven are 4-3 in Super Bowl debuts.
37: The Lions have very little playoff success in their franchise history. Detroit has just three playoff wins since 1967. To the contrary, there are 37 players on San Francisco's current active roster with at least three individual playoff wins, according to Elias Sports Bureau.
In other words, 67% of 49ers players have as many playoff wins as the Lions franchise did in the Super Bowl era.
11: Detroit has the fourth-longest active championship drought in the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL, with its last championship dating back to 1957. The Lions are also looking to earn their first road playoff victory since 1957, against the 49ers.
Since then, Detroit has lost 11 straight road playoff games, the longest road losing streak in NFL playoff history.
27: The 49ers and Lions did much of their damage on the field. They are both tied for the NFL lead with 27 rushing touchdowns during the regular season.
San Francisco's Christian McCaffrey (14), Detroit's David Montgomery (13) and Jahmyr Gibbs (10) were all in the top 10 in rushing touchdowns during the regular season.
ESPN Stats & Information contributed to this story.
