ST. LOUIS — If you happened to tune in to the San Francisco 49ers game against the Los Angeles Rams at SoFi Stadium on Sunday, you might have confused it for a 49ers home game.
Although the Rams' displayed their tagline "Whose house? Rams' house" proudly throughout the stadium, 49ers fans seemed to have other plans.
Stan Kroenke's Los Angeles palace was packed with red and gold, and was often louder in support of the visiting team than it was for the home Rams in the pivotal Week 18 match-up.
And that's not just an observation watching 1,800 miles away on TV. The players on both teams felt it, too.
“I feel like the Rams pump noise because there wasn’t that many Rams fans there," 49ers star receiver Deebo Samuel said after the game, as reported by San Francisco beat writer Nick Wagoner.
The Rams' players didn't exactly refute that notion.
"It was a tough environment for us to communicate in, really the entire second half," Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford said after the game, as reported by USA Today's Cameron DaSilva.
The 49ers used that fan support to help climb out of a 17-point deficit to beat the Rams 27-24 and clinch a postseason berth. This was the 49ers' sixth straight win over the Rams.
The 49ers will match up against the Dallas Cowboys in the first round of the NFL playoffs. The Rams won the NFC West, and will take on their division rivals, the Arizona Cardinals in the first round of the playoffs.
The rest of the NFL playoff picture looks like this:
NFC
No. 1 Green Bay - BYE
No. 2 Tampa Bay vs. No. 7 Philadelphia
No. 3 Dallas vs. No. 6 San Francisco
No. 4 Los Angeles vs. No. 5 Arizona
AFC
No. 1 Tennessee - BYE
No. 2 Kansas City vs. No. 7 Pittsburgh
No. 3 Buffalo vs. No. 6 New England
No. 4 Cincinnati vs. No. 5 Las Vegas