{"id":392718,"date":"2026-01-05T08:17:05","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T08:17:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/392718\/"},"modified":"2026-01-05T08:17:05","modified_gmt":"2026-01-05T08:17:05","slug":"nfl-playoff-schedule-afc-and-nfc-wild-card-matchups","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/392718\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL playoff schedule: AFC and NFC wild-card matchups"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img alt=\"Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Calvin Austin celebrates with tight end Pat Freiermuth after catching a touchdown pass against the Baltimore Ravens.\" fetchpriority=\"high\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/USATSI_27935002-1024x683.jpg\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"responsive\" class=\"image-next-root\" style=\"border-top-left-radius:0px;border-top-right-radius:0px;border-bottom-right-radius:0px;border-bottom-left-radius:0px;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;bottom:0;right:0;box-sizing:border-box;padding:0;border:none;margin:auto;display:block;width:0;height:0;min-width:100%;max-width:100%;min-height:100%;max-height:100%;object-fit:cover\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"Article_ImageCaptionCredit__mkXi_ article-image-caption-credit Typography_body1__xfKuc inherit Typography_base__jzSqr\">Calvin Austin caught the game-winning 26-yard touchdown pass as the Steelers clinched the AFC&#8217;s last playoff spot with a 26-24 win over the Ravens on Sunday night. Charles LeClaire \/ Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p>By The Athletic Staff<\/p>\n<p>Jan. 4, 2026Updated Jan. 5, 2026 2:00 am EST<\/p>\n<p>The NFL playoff schedule was released at halftime of Sunday night\u2019s Baltimore Ravens-Pittsburgh Steelers game, and the rivals were fighting at Acrisure Stadium for the last postseason spot.<\/p>\n<p>The Steelers will get an extra day of rest for holding on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6941023\/2026\/01\/04\/ravens-steelers-score-result-takeaways-afc-north-title\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">to beat the Ravens 26-24 and win the AFC North<\/a> to make the playoffs. They will host a Monday night showdown on Jan. 12 against the Houston Texans to close out the wild-card round.<\/p>\n<p>The Denver Broncos and Seattle Seahawks will receive byes into the divisional round as the top seeds in the AFC and NFC, respectively, while the rest of the field will play in the wild-card round next Saturday through Monday. Two wild-card games are set for Saturday, three for Sunday and one on Monday night.<\/p>\n<p>The divisional round playoffs will be on Jan. 17-18, the conference championship games on Jan. 25 and Super Bowl LX on Feb. 8 at Levi\u2019s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a look at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6931898\/2026\/01\/05\/nfl-playoff-chances-matchups-super-bowl-odds\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">wild-card matchups<\/a> (all times Eastern):<\/p>\n<p>AFC<\/p>\n<p>No. 1 Denver Broncos (14-3) first-round bye<\/p>\n<p>No. 7 Los Angeles Chargers (11-6) at No. 2 New England Patriots (14-3), 8 p.m. Sunday, NBC<\/p>\n<p>No. 6 Buffalo Bills (12-5) at No. 3 Jacksonville Jaguars (13-4), 1 p.m. Sunday, CBS<\/p>\n<p>No. 5 Houston Texans (12-5) at No. 4 Pittsburgh Steelers (10-7), 8 p.m. Monday, ESPN\/ABC<\/p>\n<p>NFC<\/p>\n<p>No. 1 Seattle Seahawks (14-3) first-round bye<\/p>\n<p>No. 7 Green Bay Packers (9-7-1) at No. 2 Chicago Bears (11-6), 8 p.m. Saturday, Amazon Prime<\/p>\n<p>No. 6 San Francisco 49ers (12-5) at No. 3 Philadelphia Eagles (11-6), 4:30 p.m. Sunday, Fox<\/p>\n<p>No. 5 Los Angeles Rams (12-5) at No. 4 Carolina Panthers (8-9), 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Fox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Calvin Austin caught the game-winning 26-yard touchdown pass as the Steelers clinched the AFC&#8217;s last playoff spot with&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":392719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,1261,1257,1248,1256,1243,1255,1237,3052,1263,1231,593,1260,1241,1262,1254,85],"class_list":["post-392718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-buffalo-bills","tag-carolina-panthers","tag-chicago-bears","tag-denver-broncos","tag-green-bay-packers","tag-houston-texans","tag-jacksonville-jaguars","tag-los-angeles-chargers","tag-los-angeles-rams","tag-new-england-patriots","tag-nfl","tag-philadelphia-eagles","tag-pittsburgh-steelers","tag-san-francisco-49ers","tag-seattle-seahawks","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/392719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}