The coaching matchup for Super Bowl 54 is an extremely interesting one, as wunderkind Kyle Shanahan will try to outmatch the wily veteran Andy Reid.
With two weeks between conference championships and the Super Bowl, coaches can have an ever larger impact than normal with extra time to prepare, game-plan and get their players ready for such an important matchup.
With this in mind, I turned to our Bet Labs software which includes archived NFL betting data since the start of the 2003 season, to determine if there are any edges to be unearthed when it comes to an extra week of rest.
And yes, one Super Bowl 54 head coach has a clear advantage over the other when it comes to against-the-spread (ATS) results.
Super Bowl 54 Betting Trends: Andy Reid vs. Kyle Shanahan
Reid is not only one of the best coaches straight up (19-6 overall since 2003) when given an extra week to prepare, but that also shows up in ATS records.
Over that span, the Chiefs head coach is 16-9 (64%) ATS when his team hasn't played in at least 11 days.
Shanahan is in just his third season as a head coach, so his sample of games following off-weeks is much smaller than Reid's, but in six opportunities the 49ers coach has covered just twice. However, one of those did come in the Divisional Round against the Vikings.
Obviously, the sample for both coaches is too small to make these trends actionable in their own right, but if you're already leaning toward taking this Chiefs, Reid's ATS record with extra time certainly isn't a negative.
