NFL conference championship predictions: Picks against the spread for Sunday

The Super Bowl is supposed to be the pinnacle of any NFL season, but sometimes it’s an anti-climax.That’s what happens when the two marqee teams and quarterbacks meet in the league championship game — such as Sunday when Josh Allen and the Bills meet Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs at Arrowhead. This is becoming almost an annual dance for Allen and Mahomes, who matched up in the playoffs after the 2020, 2021 and 2023 seasons.

The Chiefs have won all three of those games and covered the spread each time.The Over has hit in each collision, as two of the league’s top quarterbacks combined for 62, 78 and 51 points, respectively. The story has been different in the regular season, when Allen is 4-1 both straight up and against the spread against Mahomes.

That tally includes the Bills’ 30-21 victory over the Chiefs on Nov.17 in Orchard Park.

That game will be remembered as Kansas City’s only legitimate loss of the season — their only other defeat came in Week 18 when Mahomes and many of the starters were resting. I’m purposely avoiding too deep of a dive into the stats of that Week 11 game for a few reasons: One, as I mentioned, Buffalo’s regular-season success has not carried over into the postseason vs.Kansas City.

And two, Mahomes threw two interceptions in that game — on his first pass and his last.It’s not a good bet to expect him to throw two more Sunday, not when he’s been intercepted just eight times on 697 postseason throws, and has eight touchdown passes and zero interceptions against the Bills in the three playoff meetings. I’ve suspected all season that this finally might be Allen’s year to get the Bills to the Super Bowl and win it.

But now that the moment of truth has arrived, I don’t believe they’ll have enough answers player-for-player across the board. I’ll have to side with the full force of Isiah Pacheco, Travis Kelce, Xavier Worthy, Chris Jones and George Karlaftis, with Andy Reid and Steve Spagnuolo on the si...