(Doug Williams celebrates. Photo courtesy of Focus on Sport / Getty Images)

1/31/1988 - Redskins dominate Broncos in Super Bowl

The Washington Redskins destroy the favored Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXII. The Broncos got out to a 10-0 start, but Washington tallied 35 points on five touchdowns in a record-setting second quarter to blow the game wide open. When it was all said and done, the Redskins had trounced Denver, 42-10, and the game MVP was the man everyone had been talking about for weeks and weeks: Doug Williams.

Williams tallied 340 passing yards, four touchdowns, and, more significantly, was the first black quarterback to ever play in the Super Bowl. Now he was the first black quarterback to ever win in the Super Bowl and the first to win the MVP. In the NFL, African-Americans regularly filled almost every spot on the football field. But at the quarterback position, the position filled by the face and leader of the team, this was not the case; of the 28 teams in the NFL, only three started a black quarterback in 1987.

''I don't think the Redskins brought me in to be the first black quarterback to be in the Super bowl,'' said Williams, who had a root-canal less than 24 hours before the game. ''They brought me in to be the quarterback of the Redskins.''

At quarterback, he succeeded in leading the Redskins to the greatest scoring output in a Super Bowl quarter. But while Williams flourished, Broncos quarterback John Elway -- believed to be the best player in the game -- was awful, completing only five of 24 passes at one point. It was a performance that would dog him onto he won it all a decade later.

Williams' ascension was particularly impressive because he wasn't the outright quarterback for the Redskins. At 32 years old, he got the go for the that year because Jay Schroeder, who was No. 1 on the depth chart, had separated his shoulder in the first game of the year. Doug only played in four more games the rest of his career and retired at the end of the '88 season. He was replaced in the middle of the year by Mark Rypien, a Canadian-born player who would lead the Redskins to a Super Bowl win in 1992.

(Beebe slaps the ball away. Photo by Chris O'Meara, AP Photos)

1/31/1993 - Lett's fumble highlights blowout

The Buffalo Bills play in their third consecutive Super Bowl, and for the third straight year, they lose to a different team in the NFC East. In '91 it was to the Giants, in '92 it was to the Redskins, and this time around, the Bills went up against the Dallas Cowboys -- the team of the 90's. Dallas throttled the Bills, 52-17, and vindicated the new ownership that had replaced coach Tom Landry with Jimmy Johnson.

In a game with one of the largest margins of victory ever, and a whopping ten turnovers from the Buffalo Bills, it was a miscue from the winning team that was the lasting image of Super Bowl XXVII. The gaffe, one of the most famous blunders ever, came from Cowboys defensive tackle Leon Lett. Late in the final quarter, with the game already decided, Lett recovered a fumble near the midfield line. Lett raced down the sideline and was all alone as he approached the end zone for a touchdown. But as he reached the ten-yard line, he slowed down and watched himself on the stadium Jumbotron. As he attempted to imitate teammate Michael Irvin's celebration dance, Bills receiver Don Beebe, who had been catching up to him the entire time, reached out and slapped the ball away just before Lett crossed into the end zone. The play was ruled a touchback, depriving Lett of a TD and the Cowboys from a Super Bowl record 59 points.

(Elway celebrates his second championship. Photo by Joe Traver, Getty Images)

1/31/1999 - Broncos win back-to-back

John Elway adds a final accomplishment to his lauded NFL career as the Denver Broncos beat the Atlanta Falcons, 34-19, in Super Bowl XXXIII. At 38 years old, Elway became the oldest Super Bowl MVP in history by throwing for 336 yards and even rushing for a TD. After repeated failures in the early half of his career, Elway finished his time in the NFL in style: winning back-to-back Super Bowls.

The predominant storyline of the game was whether or not it would be John Elway's final appearance in a Broncos jersey (which it was). The other one was the animosity between Elway and Falcons coach Dan Reeves, who had previously coached him in Denver. In 1993, when the Broncos fired Reeves, Elway had responded by saying, "These last three years have been hell. I know I would not have been back here if Dan Reeves had been here. It wasn't worth it to me. I didn't enjoy it. It wasn't any fun, and I got tired of working with him."

Reeves then responded by saying, "Just tell him it wasn't exactly heaven for me either. One of these days I hope he grows up. Maybe he'll mature sometime."

In the end, it was Elway who got the last laugh.

As evidenced by the three games above, the Super Bowls in the 80's and 90's weren't exactly great games (to say the least). Giant twenty and thirty-point blowouts were common, and the games that were within double-digits still weren't pulse-pounding by any means. Thankfully, the games got a lot better as the calendar turned over to 2000 -- the next decade produced six close games, with five of them considered among the greatest of all time.