Super Bowl LI XXXVIII in 2004, which also featured the New England Patriots against that season's NFC South champion Carolina Panthers. It was also the third time the Super Bowl has been played in Houston, with Super Bowl VIII in 1974 having been held at Rice Stadium. With the Astros baseball team reaching the World Series eight months later, Houston would become just the fourth city to host both the Super Bowl and Fall Classic in the same calendar year, following San Diego (1998), Detroit (2006) and Arlington, Texas (2011); and the first among the four to win the Major League Baseball championship.
Super Bowl XII on a halfback option play to receiver Golden Richards. For the first and only time, two players won Super Bowl MVP honors: defensive tackle Randy White and defensive end Harvey Martin. This was also the first time that a defensive lineman was named Super Bowl MVP. The NFL awarded Super Bowl XII to New Orleans on March 16, 1976 at the NFL owners meetings held in San Diego. It would be the first of seven Super Bowls (as of 2017) to be played in the Superdome, though it was not the first one scheduled in the Superdome; Super Bowl IX