One fan base has never seen its team win a Super Bowl, while it’s been more than two decades for the other.

The championship droughts have local supporters of the Cincinnati Bengals and Los Angeles Rams champing at the bit to get Sunday’s game underway.

For the Pope family of Jim Thorpe, this Super Bowl has extra special meaning.

A Bengals fan since the age of 2, Nick Pope, a 2001 Jim Thorpe Area High School graduate, unexpectedly passed away in April. Nick’s mom, Lucia, said her son will have the best seat in the house for Sunday’s game and will undoubtedly be the 12th man on the field for the orange and black.

“He really liked the name of the team and their colors with the orange and black tiger stripes,” Lucia said of how Nick got his start as a Bengals fan. “His favorite player was Boomer Esiason, their quarterback in the ’80s. He used Esiason’s No. 7 when he played sports in Jim Thorpe from Little League through high school.”

Nick, like many Bengals fans in the late ’80s, was also drawn to Ickey Woods and the back’s infamous end zone dance, the “Ickey Shuffle.”

When the team drafted Joe Burrow, Lucia said, Nick predicted the team would be “great again.”

“He was so right,” Lucia said. “Nick waited so long for them to go to the Super Bowl again. His 6-year-old son now loves the Bengals as well. Nick would be so proud and so excited for this game.”

It was 1985 when then 7-year-old Jason Boris of Tamaqua was looking for an NFL team to call his own.

“I saw the striped helmets and I saw the colors, orange and black, and thought it was all really cool,” said Boris, who is now 43 and a nationally respected NFL mock draft specialist. “They became my team and I stuck with them.”

Boris said he remembers the Bengals’ last Super Bowl appearance in 1988, specifically a friendly wager he made with his teacher at the time, Dave “Whitey” Williams.

“Whitey was a big football guy obviously and I was about the only Bengals fan around,” Boris recalled. “Who would have thought that it would be another 33 years until I saw the Bengals back in the Super Bowl? It’s been a tough three decades. Obviously being a Bengals fan you had to sit through the ridicule. You had to sit through people making fun of you and all the “Bungles” references. Just stay true to your colors.”

During the three-plus decade drought, Boris has gone to Cincinnati to see a few games. He recalled fans being given a brown paper bag, a joke aimed at Bengals owner Mike Brown, to wear over his head during the game.

“I never put it on,” Boris said, “but I still have it.”

Like all Bengals games, Boris plans to watch the Super Bowl alone in his house.

“I don’t go out with people,” he said. “I like to be by myself in the moment. These three playoff games have certainly sent my blood pressure up. I was thrilled that they won the division. I was on cloud nine when they won their first playoff game because I waited 31 years for that. And then I got two more road playoff victories, which Cincinnati had never won a road playoff game in their existence, and now here we are playing in the Super Bowl. It’s still surreal to me.”

As for his prediction, Boris likes a 34-31 Bengals victory, calling the orange and black a “team of destiny” this year.

Growing up in Blairstown, New Jersey, most of Bob Thourot’s friends were Yankees and Giants fans. He, however, took to the Los Angeles teams after playing a baseball board game as the Dodgers and learning their roster inside out.

“From that point on, I was a Dodgers and Rams fan,” Thourot said. “Followed the Rams to St. Louis with the Greatest Show on Turf and now back to Los Angeles. They are going up against the underdog story and I know a lot of people don’t like the Hollywood types the Rams have on this team, but I feel great about this game and this season.”

Thourot will be watching the game at home, but how loud the volume is on his television is going to depend on how things are going on the field.

“I’m a little superstitious, so when I think the Rams need a big play from Cooper Kupp, I’ll turn the volume to level 10 because that’s the number he wears,” Thourot said. “If we need a little Cam Akers run, I’ll crank it up to 23. It’s been working so that’s what we’re going to do.”

While he gave a little thought about going to the game, Thourot said the several thousand dollars it would have taken to make it happen may have put in dent in his and his wife’s plan to put two girls through college.

As for the game itself, Thourot said the Rams need to put up a big number to win.

“I think they need at least 30 points and I think they’ll get it,” he said. “I love Aaron Donald and this quarterback, (Matthew) Stafford, is a lot more gutsy and I think he’ll get the job done.”

It was the flashy touchdown Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson touchdown celebrations that drew Michael Perkins, 25, of Lehighton, to the Bengals.

“He put on the Hall of Fame jacket one time after he scored and, as a 7-year-old, his celebrations kept me entertained,” Perkins said. “From there, I was just a Bengals fan long term. There were a few years where I thought they had a chance to go further than they did. To see them get to the Super Bowl this year, it’s exciting and I’m nervous all at the same time.”

Perkins plans to make it back in time for the game Sunday after a trip to the Baltimore area to visit his brother, who is training for the Air Force.

“I think if the Bengals can protect Joe Burrow, then I think they win a close one, probably around the 27-24 range,” he said.

Cheering for the Rams has been a family tradition for Jenn Domines, 39, of Nesquehoning.

In fact, her uncle made a homemade plaque of a Rams player that still hangs on the wall of her grandmother’s house almost as a family emblem.

“I’m probably the biggest Rams fan in our family today,” Domines said. “I still have the Rams troll I got when I was a kid and I have multiple jerseys to choose from for the game on Sunday.”

Domines has traveled to see the Rams play in Philadelphia and Buffalo in the past and though her team played for a title just three short years ago, she’s confident this time will be different.

“I feel like over the past couple of a years they have really invested themselves in getting all the way to the end,” she said. “Aaron Donald and Cooper Kupp shine and Matthew Stafford, while he is new to the team, has been around the block and knows the mistakes you can’t make in this situation. I really feel like they can do it.”

Two weeks ago, Domines watched the NFC Championship Game with her grandmother who cheered right along with her.

“We were screaming,” Domines said. “My grandmother is a huge football fan. When I jump up, she starts yelling too. We were probably the loudest house in New Columbus on a street filled with old people. It was wonderful.”

Joey Kiraly, 31, of Tresckow, was in New Orleans in January 2019 when a controversial no-pass interference call helped send the Rams to the Super Bowl. He, along with his father and brother-in-law, got tickets at the last minute and drove 18.5 hours to see the game.

“It was an awesome experience,” Kiraly said. “Kurt Warner was actually having a meet and greet to promote a new concussion prevention padding inside the helmet and we had a chance to meet him.”

Kiraly said his father instilled the loyalty to the Rams in him and his two sisters at a young age. He plans to spend Sunday hanging out at his house having a Super Bowl party.

“I think Cincinnati’s playoff inexperience is going to hurt them,” he said. “The Rams have a great defensive line and I don’t think the Bengals can hold up against that pressure.”

Among Bengal fans with local ties, Ken Arndt, member of the Panther Valley Class of 1982, may have the most impressive resume.

A fan since his parents gave him a football signed by the 1972 team, Arndt has been a season ticket holder for around a decade, traveled to 18 NFL drafts, attended both Bengals games in London and has two Bengals tattoos.

“It’s been a lot of heartache,” he said of following the franchise. “You’re always expecting the worst. No matter what happens, you always expect a fumble, an interception or a key injury to wipe out a game or a season.”

The old Bengals, Arndt said, would have collapsed down 18 points to the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC Championship team. This team, however, showed a resiliency the former Summit Hill resident had never seen.

“The attitude of the team and the fan base is totally different now,” Arndt said. “I’ve played sports and been around sports a long time and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a turnaround happen like this. Instead of how are they going to lose the game, you start thinking about what are they going to do to get back in the game and win it.”

Bengals games, Arndt said, bring his family together and this Sunday will be no different as he plans to host a Super Bowl party.

“My daughter is a Bengals fan and my mother, she’s getting up there you know but she gets into it,” Arndt said. “She’ll definitely be here for this.”

Unlike some other fans, Arndt is predicting a lower scoring, 24-21 win for the Bengals.