Kyle Shanahan: 49ers' Super Bowl Loss to Chiefs 'Different' Than Falcons' Defeat

Kyle Shanahan has now been on hand for two of the most epic Super Bowl comebacks in recent history. Unfortunately, he's been on the wrong side of both. 

In 2017, he was the offensive coordinator for the Atlanta Falcons, who blew a 28-3 lead to the New England Patriots. Then this past February, as head coach of the San Francisco 49ers, his team couldn't hang on to a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter against the Kansas City Chiefs. However, he doesn't think the two losses are comparable. 

"This one was different to me," Shanahan told The Athletic's Tim Kawakami on his podcast, The TK Show (h/t Marcus White of NBCS Bay Area). "We were up 10. It's not like we blew a huge lead, it was two possessions, and on those two possessions they scored and on our two possessions we didn't convert a third down. It flipped like that, and it was just over really quick. But it wasn't like we blew anything. They converted a third-and-long, and we didn't."

In part, that's what makes it harder for the coach to make his peace with the most recent loss. 

Kansas City won and San Francisco lost, but neither side was embarrassed. The game was right there for the taking, and the Niners missed their chance. There may not be much shelf life in turning Super Bowl LIV into an extension of the Falcons' misfortune, but that doesn't mean the pain won't linger just the same. 

A number of things had to go right for the Patriots to mount their comeback. That wasn't the case for the Chiefs. Pinpointing where it all went wrong is almost too easy. 

"[The Falcons] went on an 85-yard drive on offense in the third quarter to go up 28-3 with five minutes to go in [the quarter]," Shanahan said. "From that point on, New England had [351] yards of offense and [eight incompletions]. So, like, whatever. And we didn't convert our [three] third downs. Who gets [351] yards of offense in a quarter? They just went off, and it is what it is."

The questions don't appear to get any easier to answer for Shanahan, either. 

At the NFL Scouting Combine in February, the coach responded to a similar query about the two games and didn't have much to say. 

"I think this one was harder than the last one," Shanahan said, per Jennifer Lee Chan of NBCS Bay Area. "The last one was a bigger loss, I mean at the end and stuff. I just thought we were a better team. The hardest thing for me is I thought we were the best team in the NFL."

That may be the biggest difference when it comes to transitioning from offensive coordinator to head coach: The losses hit harder and for longer. And until his team gets back on the field, there's little he can do about it.