Bengals' Zac Taylor doesn't have fond memories of Super Bowl loss with the Rams

When the Bengals meet the Rams in Sunday's big game, one of the head coaches will be facing not only his former team, but a team with which his last game coaching was a losing effort in the Super Bowl itself.

Zac Taylor coached the Rams in Super Bowl LIII

As the Cincinnati Bengals prepare for their Super Bowl showdown against the Los Angeles Rams, their head coach Zac Taylor will be preparing for a serious case of nostalgia as well. Taylor has taken the Bengals on an historic path to Super Bowl LVI, in just his third season as head coach. Indeed the Bengals are returning to the Super Bowl for the first time in more than three decades. Though as young as he is, Sunday won't be Taylor's first rodeo. It is in fact his second time coaching in the league's biggest game. In the years before the Bengals hired him, Taylor actually worked under Sean McVay as the quarterbacks coach of the Los Angeles Rams. In his final game with them, the Rams lost 13-3 to a Tom Brady led New England Patriots in Super Bowl LIII. The Bengals hired him on the very next day.

From Rams to Bengals: Zac Taylor opens up

When asked on Thursday about his time with the Rams and that fateful loss in his final game, Taylor couldn't hide his conflicting emotions about the result in the end. With that said he did acknowledge that as one door closed another opened, which set him and his family on a new journey. "I don't know that I've ever really processed the game in its entirety because you woke up the next morning and it was an exciting time for myself and my family," Taylor said. "So that's a hard question to ask. It's a good question. I don't even honestly have a great answer for you because it was such a wild conflict over, really, a 12-hour period for me. To get to where we were at — I still remember Tom Brady and Bill Belichick walking by me in the hallway after they won the game and the excitement on their faces. I've never forgotten that. It was crushing to see. Then again, to wake up the next morning and be on a plane to come here [to Cincinnati] for a press conference, that was exciting. So I've never really properly processed that."

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How time flies. Just three years later and here we are with Taylor holding the reigns of a Bengals team, that will play in Super Bowl LVI come Sunday night. Standing in front of him and his team is a collection of familiar faces with the same intent, win. If Taylor is to get the better of his former colleague in what promises to be one of the most watched Super Bowls in years, it will require that he puts the past behind him and focuses totally the on present, which is that after 33 years, the Cincinnati Bengals are one win away from being NFL Champions.