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Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and the Pressure to Win: The Game That Will Decide the Kansas City Chiefs’ Season.

Travis Kelce, Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs have a very important game early in the 2025 season.

The Kansas City Chiefs likely still feel the sting of falling short in the big game to the Philadelphia Eagles, but they’re gearing up for a big 2025 season and hope to make it back to the big dance. Now that the NFL has released their 2025 season schedule, the Chiefs know exactly who their opponents are and when they’ll play them. Glancing at the schedule, some games seem easier than others, but this is the NFL, of course, so no game is truly easy.

Looking at the Chiefs’ roster of games for 2025, the Kansas City Chiefs have one of the tougher schedules in the league this season, although far from the hardest. NFL expert and analyst Ralph Vacchiano of Fox Sports is predicting the most important games of the season for each team in the league.

In a May 15 feature for Fox Sports, Vacchiano looks at the most important, and best, game for every NFL team in 2025. In the story, he notes that, “everyone in the NFL says it at some point during the season: This is the game we circled on our calendar.”

He adds, “Players and coaches say it every year. Sometimes they say it several times. Usually it’s about rivalry games. Sometimes it’s a playoff rematch. Often times, it has something to do with revenge.” His tally includes games that are a “big test, a huge rivalry or an opportunity for revenge that should be juicy enough for everyone in the organization to get excited about.”

For the Chiefs, he picks the Eagles at the Chiefs in Week 2, which is Sunday, September 14. Honestly, there is no other game he could have picked. This will truly be the rematch of the season, counting any team.

Chiefs vs. Bills: Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce arrive at Arrowhead Stadium  for AFC Championship Game - Yahoo Sports

“The Chiefs didn’t just lose Super Bowl LIX — and their shot at a history-making three-peat in the process — they were humiliated,” he stated in the piece. Ouch. “It wasn’t just that they lost 40-22. They were in a 34-0 hole before they scored their first points in the waning seconds of the third quarter.”

He added, “They’ve been thinking of the rematch since the green confetti started flying around the New Orleans Superdome that night.”

On May 9, the NFL released the predicted “strength of schedule” for all 32 NFL teams, and the Chiefs were ranked as having the 11th most difficult schedule in the league. The team with the toughest schedule is the New York Giants, and the team with the easiest schedule is the San Francisco 49ers.

The NFL also released its official 2025 holiday schedule of games on May 15, and the league will host three Christmas Day games. One of those, once again, is a Chiefs game. This is only the third time in NFL history that Christmas Day will be home to a regular-season tripleheader. The teams playing on Christmas Day include the Commanders vs. Cowboys at 1 p.m. Eastern time, the Vikings vs. Lions at 4:30 p.m. Eastern time and the Chiefs vs. Broncos at 8:20 p.m. Eastern time.

The season starts with the NFL Kickoff Game on Thursday, September 4, with the Philadelphia Eagles against the Dallas Cowboys.

Anne Erickson Anne Erickson is an award-winning reporter for Heavy.com and Heavy Sports covering the NFL, NBA and college football. Erickson has years of experience covering the NFL and additional sports, and her work has been published via ESPN, Fox Sports and more. She has interviewed some of the biggest names in sports, including Detroit Lions quarterback Jared Goff. Erickson also hosts several podcasts and is a Detroit-based radio host. More about Anne Erickson

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