NFL First Touchdown

Who will play in Super Bowl LX? That’s what we will answer this week with two conference championship games. The question we will attempt to answer here is who will score the first touchdown in this weekend’s two games? All of the data has been compiled and the oddsmakers have put up their numbers, so we have a few different things to chew on.

Before getting into those two games specifically, let’s look at the First Touchdown Scorers by position from the Divisional Round with a counter by position for the playoffs as a whole.

QB: 0 (1)

RB: 1 (LAR) (3)

WR: 4 (BUF, CHI, HOU, NE) (9)

TE: 0 (2)

D/ST: 1 (SEA) (1)

No TD: 1 (SF) (3)

Other: 1 (DEN OL Frank Crum)

By position during the regular season, it was 36, 176, 187, 82, 26, and 36 in that order, plus one offensive lineman TD. I don’t know if there’s really anything to be gleaned from the lopsided number of passing TDs compared to rushing TDs, with 11 WR/TE scores. Theoretically, you do have a better set of quarterbacks in the postseason than you do in the regular season, so perhaps that has something to do with it.

You can check out the First Touchdown Scorer Tracker to see everybody’s 2025 results. Here are where things stand with the playoff teams.

Here are the results for the remaining playoff teams:

Playoff teams First TD of game/games played Success rate
Seahawks 13/18 72.20%
Rams 12/19 63.20%
Broncos 10/18 55.60%
Patriots 9/19 47.40%

New England’s 9/19 is not overly impressive, but they have scored first in six of the last seven games and both playoff games. Considering how they started the season, they’ve done very well as it has gone along. Both the Patriots and Rams have scored the first TD in each of their playoff games. The Broncos did not score first last week, while the Seahawks ran the opening kickoff back for six. Obviously all of the Broncos data points are with Bo Nix, the only QB to throw a pass for the team this season.

You can check the First Touchdown Tracker to see the 3+ TD guys. I’ll consider that in my handicapping, but won’t post the entire list the rest of the way.

With that, let’s get to the AFC and NFC Championship action and look at some mismatches from 2025 and some best bets. I’ll be using DraftKings odds because they’re widely available, but SHOP AROUND for the best prices. Sportsbooks are all over the place on the FTD market, and the onus is on you to get as much bang for your buck as possible.

NFL Conference Championship Schedule and FTD Rates from 2025

Patriots (47.4%) at Broncos (55.6%) – 3 p.m. ET

Rams (63.2%) at Seahawks (72.2%) – 6:30 p.m. ET

I’ll flip the script a little bit this week and pick two players from each team in hopes of nailing at least one of the two games. While the 55.6% for Denver is with Nix, Jarrett Stidham’s been around a while and has played in Sean Payton’s system, so I don’t think it would be stunning to see them score first.

Remember, while the purpose of this article is ultimately to try and pick the first touchdown scorer, this type of intel can help with first quarter and first half betting, plus live betting, so don’t be afraid to use it in that context.

NFL AFC and NFC Championship First Touchdown Predictions

Lines current at time of publish

Remember – these are first TD odds for the game; you can also use all of the info in this weekly article to bet first team TD at your preferred sportsbook as well.

Patriots: Hunter Henry +900, Drake Maye +1300

Henry (33.8%) was second to Amon-Ra St. Brown (41.5%) in percentage of team targets in the red zone. Even Austin Hooper had a couple of first team TDs, so the Patriots are really looking towards the tight end in the scoring areas, as Josh McDaniels offenses always have.

With Maye, he had a 21.3% rush attempts share inside the 20, while Rhamondre Stevenson was at 29.2% and TreVeyon Henderson was at 38.2% during the regular season. In the playoffs, though, I think you’d prefer the ball in your best player’s hands as much as possible. With some run-pass options for Maye, I think he has a chance at getting there at a nice price.

The Broncos also allowed as many receiving TD to tight ends (6) as wide receivers during the regular season.

Broncos: Courtland Sutton +1500, Lil’Jordan Humphrey +5000

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Backup quarterbacks are usually looking for two things – guys that they’ve had a lot of practice reps with and the team’s best receiver. So, I’ll look at one of each here. Sutton was second to Troy Franklin in red zone target share, but Stidham doesn’t have the same rapport with him that Nix does. Franklin is also questionable for the game and hasn’t really been a factor in a while.

Humphrey probably spent a lot of time practicing with the 2s and 3s, so I’m sure Stidham has worked with him a lot. With the Franklin and Pat Bryant injuries, he’s gotten a little more run of late. Marvin Mims was also checked for a concussion last week, though he did return. While RJ Harvey is a popular choice, over 18 games so far, he’s only got one first team TD and it came in Week 8. In fact, the last RB to score first for the Broncos is Jaleel McLaughlin in Week 11. Bo Nix had two rushing TD in that span, so maybe Stidham at +1900 is a flyer worth taking, but he’s also not the runner Nix is.

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Rams: Puka Nacua +750, Colby Parkinson +1900

Per Pro-Football-Reference, Davante Adams led the league in the regular season with 23 targets inside the 10, but he only caught 11 of those balls. Nacua caught eight of his 10 targets inside the 10 and I trust him more as a result in this environment against a really good Seahawks defense.

Similarly, the big-bodied Parkinson had 10 targets with six catches inside the 10 and he was 14-of-20 on targets inside the 20. Stafford loves to look for Parkinson, who has morphed into his favorite TE target as the season has gone along. The Seahawks have only allowed five rushing TD to RB this season, including the playoffs, so I wanted to avoid Kyren Williams.

Seahawks: Kenneth Walker Jr. +450, George Holani +3500

Holani has been activated in light of the injury to Zach Charbonnet and I do wonder if Klint Kubiak will give him some chances inside the 10. Charbonnet had 50 rushing attempts in the red zone in the regular season compared to 31 for Walker per PFR. Walker was obviously excellent last week, so I don’t want to exclude him, even at the short price.

That’s 81 rush attempts for the two main backs for the Seahawks, while Sam Darnold had 66 pass attempts with 38 completions. That’s why I’ll go this route and include Holani, as Charbonnet was sixth in the regular season in percentage of team rush attempts inside the 10 with 64.6% of them.

See more NFL best bets on our Pro Picks page and get more NFL Divisional Round content in our Betting Hub.

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