1977 Super Bowl delivered long-awaited title to Raiders

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When coach John Madden's Oakland Raiders arrived at the Rose Bowl for the Super Bowl in 1977, the toughest part of the job was already done.

After years of falling short of the title game with crushing playoff losses to rivals like Miami and Pittsburgh, the Raiders made easy work of the Minnesota Vikings in a 32-14 victory Jan. 9, 1977, that made all of owner Al Davis' boasts about winning and excellence prove true.

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"They can never take it away from you," Madden said later about that Super Bowl win that was the defining moment of his coaching career. "Maybe the fact that we chased it so long made it bigger to us. It was the greatest feeling in the world. There’s nothing that can beat it."

For Davis' Raiders, the journey to the title was a long one. Oakland had lost Super Bowl 2 to Vince Lombardi's Packers with John Rauch as coach before failing six times in the next eight seasons with a berth in another Super Bowl on the line.

There was a blown fourth-quarter lead to Joe Namath's Jets in 1968; a home loss to the Chiefs after a regular season sweep of Kansas City in 1969; losses to Baltimore (1970), Miami (1973) and , in back-to-back seasons to the hated Steelers in (1974-75). Not to mention the "Immaculate Deception" loss, as Raider Nation has called it, in the divisional round in 1972.

So when they got past the Steelers 24-7 in the AFC title game two weeks earlier in 1977, there was no way the NFC's perennial heartbreak team could topple them.

"We had tougher games in the AFC than we had today," Madden said after the Super Bowl. "We had plenty of opportunities to watch others go to the