On the surface, it is very easy to paint Super Bowl LIV as yet another matchup between a great defense and a great offense, similar to Super Bowl 50 (Panthers/Broncos), Super Bowl XLVIII (Broncos/Seahawks), any of the first three Super Bowls, or many of the great ones in between.

The Chiefs have the reigning MVP of the NFL in Patrick Mahomes, and Kansas City is averaging 4.3 points (!) and 48 yards per drive this postseason. The 49ers had a dominant defense in the first half of the season, becoming just the 9th team since 2002 to allow 102 or fewer points through 8 games. In the playoffs, San Francisco held Minnesota to just 10 points and then shut out the Packers in the first half (while forcing two turnovers), effectively clinching a Super Bowl berth by halftime courtesy of a 27-0 lead.

But here’s the interesting thing: did you know that the 49ers scored more points this year than the Chiefs? And that Kansas City allowed fewer points this year than San Francisco? Strange, but true. In fact, San Francisco scored more points and gained more yards than Kansas City.

And when it comes to points allowed, the Chiefs narrowly edge the 49ers:

In DVOA, the Chiefs ranked 3rd on offense and 14th on defense, while San Francisco ranked 7th in offensive DVOA and 2nd in defensive DVOA. That’s more in line what you were probably thinking.

So what is going on here?  A few things.

1) Injuries. Patrick Mahomes missed 2.5 games during the season, which depressed Kansas City’s offensive numbers a bit.   Tyreek Hill also missed four games.  The 49ers defense suffered a number of injuries in the second half of the season — which weakened their full-season numbers — but are also healthy now.

2) Points allowed and points scored are somewhat misleading categories for San Francisco.  Jimmy Garoppolo was responsible for two touchdowns on offense, while San Francisco’s return unit had a “lateral a bunch on the last play of the game” situation that turned into a touchdown for the Falcons.  Meanwhile, the 49ers defense score 5 touchdowns on its own!  This is one of the reasons the defense is really good (5 touchdowns!) but it’s both ignored when analyzing the points allowed number and it makes the 49ers points scored number significantly higher.

3) Few drives for the Chiefs. Meanwhile, Kansas City actually scored 4 return touchdowns of their own… so why did the Chiefs “only” rank 5th in points scored?  One reason is that Kansas City had just 156 drives this season, the fewest of any team in the NFL.  Kansas City actually ranked 2nd in the NFL in points per drive — which also ignores those four return touchdowns — and the Chiefs had 23 fewer drives than San Francisco.

Let’s think of it this way: Kansas City punter Dustin Colquitt has had 48 punts this year in the regular season, and 6 more in the two playoff games. But 14 of those punts came in games that Matt Moore was the main quarterback.  This means Colquitt has had 40 punts in the 15 Mahomes games this year… which is a remarkably low number.  Last season, when the Chiefs offense was outstanding, Colquitt had 45 punts in 16 games!

The Chiefs ranked in the top 6 in time of possession per drive on offense and in the bottom 6 in time of possession per drive on defense; that, along with no overtime games and four drives lost due to return touchdowns helped Kansas City finish with the fewest drives in the NFL.    The 49ers offense was good, but it was not on the level of Kansas City’s offense.

Similarly, the 49ers faced 12 more drives on defense than the Chiefs did.  And San Francisco allowed 34 touchdowns on defense while scoring 5 of its own; The Chiefs allowed 35 touchdowns on defense and scored three of its own, all while facing fewer drives.

In general, the 49ers offense is probably underrated (especially given how successful it is on the ground) while the Chiefs defense is also probably underrated (it’s been very efficient against the pass; less so against the run, which usually is a good thing, but is potentially a significant concern in this matchup). But despite the Chiefs scoring fewer and allowing fewer points than San Francisco, we can safely say the conventional wisdom is right on this game: Kansas City has a great offense, the 49ers have a great defense, and this should be an excellent matchup of strength vs. strength.