Super Bowl LI

With the Super Bowl just around the corner, it’s common for people to begin getting ready for the game between the New England Patriots and Atlanta Falcons. One of the questions which often arises is, “How do you play Super Bowl football squares?” For those who only play the game once a year when the championship game comes around, it’s not necessarily obvious simply by looking at the chart. The good news is it’s not too difficult at all once you learn the proper way to set the game up. Properly setting up Super Bowl football squares is important because not doing so can give participants the chance to greatly increase their odds of winning by manipulating where they place their name in the squares. Once you know the basics, you can use if for any football game in the future. Below you’ll find a step by step instructions on how to play Super Bowl LI football squares:

Step One: Print the Super Bowl Football Squares Chart

The first step to playing is to print a 10 square by 10 square chart. You can do so by clicking on the image or for a larger printable football squares chart, you can follow this football squares link (pdf printable)

Step Two: Set a Price for the Value of the Squares

If you decide to make a friendly wager on the game, you next need to decide how much each square on the chart will be worth. The amount you decide is what each participant will need to pay for each square they place their name in on the chart. The amount for each square is completely up to you and can be adjusted to fit the group of people you’re going to be playing the game with. Below are a few examples of amounts you could determine each square to be worth, and what the total pool for that amount would be.

• 10 cent squares would create a total pool of $10.00
• 25 cent squares would create a total pool of $25.00
• 50 cent squares would create a total pool of $50.00
• 1 dollar squares would create a total pool of $100.00
• 2 dollar squares would create a total pool of $200.00
• 5 dollar squares would create a total pool of $500.00
• 10 dollar squares would create a total pool of $1000.00

For those who don’t want to bet money, another common option is to not sell each square for a certain amount, but to have the host buy small prizes which are given away to the winning square holders at the end each quarter or at the end of the game.

Step Three: Assign Squares

The next step is to fill in the 100 squares inside the chart. The most common way to do this is to have all those participating initial the square(s) the want for the game. Another common way is to assign each participant a color and they color in the square(s) they want. You can use any method you want to assign the squares as long as it’s easy to determine which ones belong to each participant.

The number of squares each person gets depends on the number of people playing the game. If you have 10 people playing, each would pick 10 squares. If you have 5 people playing, each would pick 20 squares. If you have 50 people playing each would pick 2 squares.

It’s important to not switch step three and four around, as doing so can give those who first choose squares a distinct advantage of winning.

Step Four: Randomly Assign Numbers 0 – 9 to Top and Side Rows

You want to have participants fill in all the squares before assigning random numbers to the Atlanta Falcons and New England Patriots rows. There are certain numbers which are far more likely to end up being a winning number than other numbers due to the way football is scored. It’s much more likely the score for each team will end with a 0, 3 or 7 than with a 2 or 5. If you fill in the top and side rows with numbers before assigning squares, those who first fill in their squares have a huge advantage as they can pick numbers which are much more likely to appear as the game’s score. Randomly assigning the numbers (this is usually done by picking the numbers out of a hat) after all the squares have been picked ensures all have an equal chance of getting the “good” numbers.

Step Five: Decide How to Award Prizes

There are a wide variety of ways to award prizes. You can decide which is best for you and the group you’re playing with. Most games give out a small amount at the end of each quarter, with a bigger prize for the participant that has the winning square at the end of the game. Below you’ll find some of the different ways you can award the prize money. For those who are giving away predetermined prizes rather than money, you should also determine how these will be awarded.

Step Six: Determine the Winners

In order to determine the winner, you need to look at the last number of the score for each team. For example, if the score is New England 14 and Seattle 13 after the first quarter, you would look for the “4” column from the Patriots side, and “3” column from the Seahawks side. Once the two columns have been determined, you run the lines together until they meet at a square which is the winner. You follow the same process with the scores at half-time, the end of the third quarter, and the final score.

Finally, if you want to learn how to improve your odds of winning Super Bowl squares, check out our article here.

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