NFL Schedule 2024 : Conference Championship

Image courtesy - Getty Images

The National Football League (NFL) is the premier professional American football league in the United States. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, the NFL grew in popularity, and the league began to expand, with new teams being added and the championship game becoming more widely watched.

In 1960, the American Football League (AFL) was established as a rival league to the NFL. The two leagues competed with each other for players, fans, and television contracts, but in 1966, the two leagues agreed to merge. The merger led to the creation of the Super Bowl, a Championship game between the two leagues' champions. Today, it is the most anticipated and widely watched sports game in the United States amongst all sporting leagues.

The NFL regular season is the heart and soul of the NFL. It typically spans around 18 game weeks and the NFL prepares a rigorous schedule to ensure an even flow of matchups. This schedule contains all of the event’s time, date, and location information. The NFL schedule is crucial not only for football fans and their viewership but also for the players who need to compete week in and week out.

From the release of the preseason schedule to the exciting kickoff of the regular season, each step in the timeline builds anticipation and fuels the passion of fans. The formulation of the schedule requires careful consideration of divisional and conference matchups, balancing team schedules, and strategic placement of marquee games.

2024 - 25 NFL Season

The NFL regular season is the heart and soul of professional football. It typically runs from early September to early January, spanning 18 weeks. During this time, teams compete in a series of 17 games, while the remaining one week is a bye week for each team. The NFL schedule 2024 came out on May 15, 2024.

The regular season is divided into weeks, and teams play their opponents based on a predetermined schedule. Matchups are strategically arranged to ensure fair competition and diversity of opponents.

Each team faces divisional rivals twice (home and away), conference opponents, and a rotation of teams from the opposite conference. The conference and non-conference divisions are also rotation based providing all teams a fair chance at playing every other NFL team at least once in four years.

Teams strive to secure victories and accumulate wins throughout the regular season. These wins determine playoff eligibility and seeding for the postseason. The NFL postseason is the elimination round of games that follow the conclusion of the regular season.

How does the NFL decide on the schedule?

The NFL schedule is highly anticipated by fans and players alike. The NFL regular season schedule for this year spans 18 weeks. With one bye week planned during the season, each club plays 17 games.

The NFL will play up to 14 games in some weeks, even though up to four teams have bye weeks planned. The NFL schedule typically features games on Thursday, Sunday, and Monday. Sundays are when the great majority of games are played. There can be games planned on Friday or Saturday in certain weeks.

The NFL Schedule takes place in an office behind closed doors and is a process that is carried out over several days. The staff working on the schedule input various parameters in a software known as Amazon Web Services (AWS) which then churns out hundreds and hundreds of possible schedules.

The scheduling team then tweaks the parameters as they need to consider all sorts of things such as which teams will be playing which opponents for the year, the scheduling complexities with stadiums, any major events occurring at the time of games in cities, and more. Finally, one schedule is selected and approved by the commissioner of the NFL.

NFL Playoffs

The postseason games follow the regular season and include the top-performing teams from the regular season. It typically runs from early January to early February, culminating with the Super Bowl. The postseason consists of a single-elimination tournament, where the top seven teams from each conference compete for conference championships and a shot at the Super Bowl.

The first round, known as Wild Card Weekend, features three wild card teams and four divisional champions from each conference. The winners advance to the Divisional Round, followed by the Conference Championships, where the two remaining teams from each conference battle for a spot in the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl is the pinnacle of the postseason, with the champions from the AFC and NFC facing off to determine the ultimate winner.

The NFL postseason is of paramount importance as it determines the conference champions and ultimately crowns the Super Bowl champion, solidifying their place in football history. It showcases the best teams, intense competition, and unforgettable moments, capturing the attention and excitement of fans worldwide.

The week before the Super Bowl, the NFL traditionally holds the Pro Bowl, the name for the league’s all-star game. With the league expanding the regular season from a 16-game schedule to 17 games, the Pro Bowl was moved from the last weekend in January to the first weekend in February.

NFL Schedule (2024-25) Key Dates and Events

The NFL 2024 schedule is out and the planning by teams has already been set in motion. As is the case every passing year, the 2024-25 NFL season promises to deliver some intriguing matchups with great storylines to talk about.

Here are the key dates and events for the 2023-24 NFL season.