Who Do the San Francisco 49ers Play Next Week? Potential Opponents and Scenarios in 2024 NFL Playoff Bracket

The San Francisco 49ers had the luxury of spending Wild Card Weekend sitting on their sofas watching the chaos of the NFL playoffs with the rest of us. However, next week the 49ers will return to the field at home in Levi’s Stadium for a Divisional Round matchup, but who will they be facing?

With the assistance of the free PFN NFL Playoff Predictor, let’s examine San Francisco’s playoff scenarios in terms of its potential Divisional Round opponents and its path into the NFC Championship Game.

Who Will the San Francisco 49ers Face in the NFC Divisional Round?

After Sunday’s action, we already know that the 49ers will face the Green Bay Packers next Saturday evening. The No. 7 seed Packers upset the No. 2 seed Dallas Cowboys on the road at AT&T Stadium.

The way the NFL playoff bracket works means that the No. 1 seed in each conference will host the lowest-remaining seed from Wild Card Weekend. With the Packers being the No. 7 and lowest seed, we know that they will head to Santa Clara.

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San Francisco is playing in its third straight postseason, having lost in the NFC Championship Game in each of the last two years. The difference this year is that the 49ers are the No. 1 seed, having been the No. 5 seed in 2021 and the No. 2 seed in 2022. That gives them a tremendous advantage with home-field advantage and the bye on Wild Card Weekend.

If San Francisco is to win against Green Bay next week, it would be assured of hosting the NFC Championship Game the next week. The highest-seeded team in each matchup is always the host, so as the No. 1 seed, the 49ers will have the honor if they win in the Divisional Round.

As things stand entering Monday morning, San Francisco would host one of the Detroit Lions, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, or Philadelphia Eagles if they were to make it to the NFC Championship Game.

However, the Packers proved on Wild Card Weekend that they’re not going to go away quietly with a 48-32 win over the Cowboys. Green Bay has also beaten San Francisco in four of their last seven meetings, giving them a 38-33-1 advantage in the all-time records. Included in those four wins are three victories in games played at Levi’s Stadium.

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The positive spin on that for the 49ers is that in the last two postseason meetings, it has been San Francisco that has come out on top. In January 2022, the 49ers won a tough battle 13-10 in Lambeau Field when the Packers were the No. 1 seed. Back in January 2020, No. 1 seed San Francisco defeated No. 2 seed Green Bay 37-20 in an NFC Championship Game demolition.

This matchup is steeped in history, with the first matchup of the two teams having taken place way back in 1950 — a 25-21 Packers victory up in Wisconsin.

Their first postseason meeting was in the 1995 NFL season. That matchup carries some intriguing symmetry with the Packers going into Candlestick Park to face a 49ers team coming off a Wild Card Weekend bye. Green Bay will hope history repeats itself after they left that game with a 27-17 victory.

In all, they’ve met nine times in the playoffs, with San Francisco having a slender 5-4 advantage. That comes on the back of a four-game postseason win streak over the Packers. However, the 49ers have never gone on to secure a Lombardi Trophy after overcoming the Packers earlier in the playoffs, twice losing in the Super Bowl.

Want to predict the results of the 2023 NFL postseason with our FREE NFL Playoff Predictor? How about looking into in-depth breakdowns of team depth charts or the NFL playoff schedule? Pro Football Network has you covered with all that and more!