Almost five months have passed since the start of the 2014 season and after a turbulent season, two of the favorite teams starting out will meet on Super Bowl Sunday. The road to Arizona had its ups and downs, its high notes and low points. What have we learned? What did we see? What did we talk about during the past season?

Here are five lessons from the 2014-15 NFL Season:

#1. It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Over

Two of the best teams in the league got to the Super Bowl, but the ways New England and Seattle made it are classic examples of how exciting and unexpected pro football can be. Both found themselves down before pulling themselves back up to the top of the league.

It started during the season, when the Patriots were in the dumps after the week 4 shellacking in Kansas City (14-41). Meanwhile, the Seahawks started their season with three losses in their first six games. Both teams had to handle criticism and cynicism. Who can remember that less than four months ago, most experts thought the Pats and Hawks were this year’s big disappointments.

But they aren’t. Both hardly lost since and made the playoffs as the no. 1 seeds. Then the comeback magic, well, came back. Both teams flipped the script in seemingly unwinnable games in the playoffs. The Patriots came back from two 14-point deficits against the Ravens in the divisional round and the Seahawks beat the Packers after trailing 0-16 in the conference championship. A thrilling ending to a thrilling season.

All of which will make the Super Bowl a tad more interesting. Even if one of the teams will take a sizeable lead, the other has already proven it ain’t over ‘til it’s over. The Patriots’ and Seahawks’ crazy rides show football is a game of moments. Momentum can change with every play. We cannot see the whole picture in the moment, but in the end there are those moments that make the picture.

#2 The Year of The Scandal(s)

It’s only fitting that the 2014 season ends with deflate gate. A season that started with a debate whether Michael Sam, an openly gay player, has a place in the league, was an all-out PR nightmare. 20 years from now, we will probably remember this season as the year of the scandal.

This is the year the league had to handle matters of domestic violence and its stance on recreational drugs use. This was the year of the leaked videos and photos, of internal investigations and legal maneuvers to find a way to discipline the players. This was the year when the headlines were captured by Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson, two players with one game between them.

The integrity of the league came into question once and again. It wasn’t only about the leadership’s ability to handle the issues; it was also about the issues themselves. Unfortunately, it seems like the football field stopped being the main attraction in many cases.

Some of the issues are socially and legally significant, others we can live without. Yet all of them put the league in a tail spin. Even leading up to the Super Bowl, instead of discussing the matchup between two great teams, the hot debate is about a low-level wrong doing. When New England and Seattle face each other on the field on Sunday, we hope that all will be temporarily forgotten. No more external drama, no more distractions, only 22 players and one fully-inflated ball.

Watch The Full Roster Of Super Bowl XLIX Advertisers

#3 The Press Matters

It used to be the media game was pretty simple. The high profile players would conduct press conferences with various degrees of insignificant chatter and during the week players would give inflammatory quotes about the next opponent in an effort to spark up the rivalry. Things aren’t so easy these days. This season saw a turning point in the handling of the media and, fittingly enough, the two Super Bowl teams led the way.

The comically passive-aggressive one-comment/no-comment presser is a new beast in the NFL. The best can make headlines by saying absolutely nothing. It is both a manipulation of the rule and of the fans’ expectations. For the Patriots, one such press conference sparked the battle cry for the season. The coach Bill Belichick’s only answer after that loss to the Chiefs was “we’re on to Cincinnati”, five words that say “don’t ask me about unpleasant things I don’t want to address. We’re only looking forward.” And since then the team never looked back.

Belichick passed the message to his team in that minimalist press conference and Marshawn Lynch perfected the system. After getting fined several times for refusing to talk to the media, Seattle running back began to make a mockery of the system. The best example might have come on December 21st when Lynch answered every question in the press conference following a win at Arizona with “thank you for asking” and not much more. Very polite, very amusing, very frustrating for the reporters and the fans who actually want to hear what he has to say.

It has the smell of a trend. The NFL probably wouldn’t want this kind of questions-and-answer dynamic to continue. In the meantime the question is how little is too much?

#4 Everybody go Boom!

On the day after the Super Bowl, all eyes turn towards building for next year. In a copycat league like the NFL, the successful teams bring the blueprint to the others. This year’s key for winning is, ironically enough, the same as last year’s: a very strong secondary.

The Seahawks built a title team around the Legion of Boom, their ultra-talented cornerbacks and safeties. This season, the Patriots copied the method and built a great secondary of their own, even adding Brandon Browner from Seattle. No matter who wins the game, it seems like both quarterbacks will have a tough time passing the ball.

As teams try to acclimate to the new pass-happy rules, it seems like the Seahawks found the winning formula: don’t be afraid to hit, to get a penalty here and there, to be physical. Those were actually the main attractions in the old days as well. Which can be the final ironic twist this season has towards the league: as the rules try to make the NFL safer, less violent and friendlier to the average fan, the successful teams are the ones who don’t subscribe to the message. Hitting and a good defense seem to forever be the winning formula in the league. Only the nicknames change.

And then this happened in 2014