What’s the weather in Kansas City today? Low temperatures for the Dolphins - Chiefs Wild Card game

The 2023 NFL wild-card weekend is upon us with a number of games taking place in extreme weather conditions as a polar front hits the US. One of the areas expected to be affected the most is Kansas City where the meteorological service has forecast brutally cold weather - possibly breaking record lows for the region.

Typically in Kansas City, the average lowest temperatures in January is around freezing but on Saturday night going into Sunday morning, thermometers are expected to read -8° C with a fierce wind chill factor making it appear much colder: -10° C or even colder.

Serve chilled

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) forecasts temperatures in Kansas City when the Chiefs wild-card clash with the Dolphins kicks off at Arrowhead stadium at 8 p.m. on Saturday to be around zero and could hit a low of around -2° C (28.4 ° F) or possibly even lower, up to -8° C (17.6 °F) as the night wears on. If the kick-off temperature is -1° C (30.2 °F), it will be the coldest game ever to have been played in KC.

The coldest temperatures ever recorded in Kansas City was a torpefying -23° C set between 22 and 23 December 1989. However, the record low this weekend could reach a bone-chilling -26° C factoring in wind chill.

Crisp conditions could favor the Chiefs

Chiefs offensive coordinator Matt Nagy hopes the weather won’t become a decisive factor on Saturday. As he told reporters this week: “Today is like nothing compared to what we’re going to get. It’s going to be 30 (degrees) or something but eight is different. I said to the guys, look a lot will be said about this, it could be an advantage. You have to create your own advantage in my opinion and the way to create them is in preparation and then doing things in the game to create an advantage. I don’t think just the fact that it might be cold – we’re not going to rely on that, I’ll put it that way.

“In the end, you have to be able to throw to win. Running the ball is very important, and we’ve improved that. But I think when you look at all of the teams that have made it - whether they’re ahead and they stay ahead or whether they’re behind and they have to throw, you do need to be able to throw the football. So, being able to be balanced, run the football - which we’ve been better at, is great. It takes pressure off the quarterback, it takes pressure off the O-line because you’re not always dropping back, throwing all the time. With that though, you’ve got to have effective runs, it can’t be two yards, one yard, three yards, you’d like to get some explosive – that’s what I think we’ve been getting lately,” he ended.

This weekend’s game could be the coldest on record at Arrowhead stadium - the previous record was 0.5° C at kick-off, set on 18 December 1983 in the 17-48 win over the Denver Broncos. But it won’t be anywhere near the coldest NFL game in history - the Ice Bowl in Green Bay Wisconsin in December 1967 holds that dubious honor.