Ralph Wilson Stadium

Address:1 Bills Dr.
Buffalo, New York

One of the most intimidating places to play in the history of the National Football League, Ralph Wilson Stadium has given the Buffalo Bills a tremendous home field advantage over the last 35 years, thanks to its notorious weather and rowdy home fans.

While it took the Bills 16 years to host a playoff game at what was then called Rich Stadium (named for Rich Products, a food company, it one of the first stadium's to bear a corporate name), they took advantage of it when the time came. After beating Houston on New Year's Day 1989, the Bills won every playoff game held here, with the exception of their last, against Jacksonville, in 1996. Along the way, the stadium saw one of the greatest runs in NFL history. The team made, although lost, four straight Super Bowls from 1989-1992, and pulled off the biggest playoff comeback in NFL history along the way.

That game, a Wild Card contest against the Oilers, came on January 3, 1993. Down 35-3 to the Houston Oilers, backup quarterback Frank Reich led a ferocious rally, capped off by a Steve Christie overtime field goal, and the Bills went on to the Super Bowl after the 41-38 win.

Although the Bills have struggled in the last decade, they still pull off at least one or two upsets late in every season when teams enter the hostile winter environs of Ralph Wilson Stadium (renamed in 1998 for the Bills' owner).

The harsh climate and heartiness of Buffalo fans also made the stadium the perfect place for the National Hockey League's first outdoor game in the United States. Held on New Year's Day, 2008, the Buffalo Sabres hosted the Pittsburgh Penguins in front of a sold out Ralph Wilson Stadium capacity crowd of 73,967. The contest lived up to its billing, as Sidney Crosby's Penguins ended up winning 2-1 in a shootout, with the young superstar, Crosby, scoring the shootout winner.

Ralph Wilson Stadium is located in the Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park, N.Y., about 15 miles southeast of downtown.