Night time is the right time for Saints in playoffs
Is early 2020 the time for the Saints to win their second Super Bowl?
History suggests that kickoff time has been a trend to how the Saints perform in the postseason.
New Orleans will have to do something it’s never done to advance past Minnesota in Sunday’s NFC Wild Card round matchup in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. But if the Saints do, history is on their side.
The Saints have played 20 playoff games in their history – seven which have kicked off before 3 p.m. local time, eight that kicked between 3-5 p.m., and five that were kickoffs after 5 p.m.
New Orleans has never won an early kickoff, going 0-7 in games kicking prior to 3 p.m. It has split the eight games that kicked between 3-5 p.m. But it has never lost a game (5-0) with a kickoff of 5 p.m. or later.
The good news is that if the Saints win on Sunday to break that early kickoff trend, they will play all of their remaining games in the late Sunday slot – at Green Bay on Jan. 12, the NFC Championship Game on Jan. 19 and Super Bowl XLIV on Feb. 2.
The Saints’ all-time playoff results, sorted by kickoff time (data courtesy Pro Football Reference):
| Date | CST | Local | Opponent | Result | OT | |
| 1/6/2001 | 11:30 | 11:30 | @ | Vikings | L 16-34 | |
| 1/3/1988 | 11:30 | 11:30 | Vikings | L 10-44 | ||
| 1/14/2012 | 3:35 | 1:35 | @ | 49ers | L 32-36 | |
| 1/8/2011 | 3:35 | 1:35 | @ | Seahawks | L 36-41 | |
| 1/11/2014 | 3:36 | 1:36 | @ | Seahawks | L 15-23 | |
| 1/20/2019 | 2:05 | 2:05 | Rams | L 23-26 | OT | |
| 1/21/2007 | 2:06 | 2:06 | @ | Bears | L 14-39 | |
| 1/3/1993 | 3:00 | 3:00 | Eagles | L 20-36 | ||
| 12/28/1991 | 3:00 | 3:00 | Falcons | L 20-27 | ||
| 1/6/1991 | 3:00 | 3:00 | @ | Bears | L 6-16 | |
| 12/30/2000 | 3:05 | 3:05 | Rams | W 31-28 | ||
| 1/16/2010 | 3:34 | 3:34 | Cardinals | W 45-14 | ||
| 1/13/2019 | 3:40 | 3:40 | Eagles | W 20-14 | ||
| 1/14/2018 | 3:40 | 3:40 | @ | Vikings | L 24-29 | |
| 1/7/2018 | 3:40 | 3:40 | Panthers | W 31-26 | ||
| 1/24/2010 | 5:45 | 5:45 | Vikings | W 31-28 | OT | |
| 2/7/2010 | 5:31 | 6:31 | N | Colts | W 31-17 | |
| 1/7/2012 | 7:09 | 7:09 | Lions | W 45-28 | ||
| 1/13/2007 | 7:11 | 7:11 | Eagles | W 27-24 | ||
| 1/4/2014 | 7:14 | 8:14 | @ | Eagles | W 26-24 |
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Lenny Vangilder
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Lenny was involved in college athletics starting in the early 1980s, when he began working Tulane University sporting events while still attending Archbishop Rummel High School. He continued that relationship as a student at Loyola University, where he graduated in 1987. For the next 11 years, Vangilder worked in the sports information offices at Southwestern Louisiana (now UL-Lafayette) and Tulane;…
