It’s time to talk about the 49ers and the Super Bowl again

INDIANAPOLIS - Before this season, San Francisco 49ers Coach Kyle Shanahan invited his longtime players over to his house. The spread he had catered would make even veterans gush about it all these months later.

“We had everything,” fullback Kyle Juszczyk recalled. “We had some pasta, we had some sashimi. We had steak. We had it all. It was a good get-together.”

The only thing missing from the menu that day was talk of expectations. Nothing about winning the NFC West (which has become the NFL’s toughest division). No discussion about the postseason. Silence about Super Bowl LX.

But what was once off-limits during that kickback at Kyle’s now should be spoken often and as loudly as possible.

Following San Francisco’s 48-27 unwrapping of the Indianapolis Colts on Monday night, here are a few talking points: how the 49ers are rising at the right time. That, somehow after all those crushing injuries, this team could capture the No. 1 seed and a first-round bye in the NFC. Also, all the ways quarterback Brock Purdy looks as formidable as the other slingers out west. And that, yes, these 49ers (11-4 and winners of five straight) are Super Bowl contenders again.

Since 2020, it has been that way around the Bay Area. But running into Patrick Mahomes (twice) or running out of healthy quarterbacks (the NFC championship game in January 2023) can cut short those conversations. Beginning this summer, however, Shanahan tried something new and shut down any talk of Super Bowl or bust.

“Every time we’ve gone to OTAs, it’s been all about trying to get to a Super Bowl, trying to win a Super Bowl. And I wanted to make sure that we didn’t really talk that way this year,” Shanahan said. “We need to focus on just trying to be the best team we could be, and we’ll see what happens.

“And it’s kind of been our motto all year, and I was just so proud that actually now [Sunday night, I] could congratulate them and actually talk about the playoffs, because they are in, and they got in there. And now it’s time to position ourselves to try to do something special.”

Shanahan knew this team would enter the season on a path different than what many of his previous rosters faced. It wasn’t as though the 49ers needed to open a day care inside its team facility in Santa Clara, California. However, after cutdown day, San Francisco had just 10 players who were 29 or older on the roster, and in the NFL, age can either save or shipwreck a team. Just look at the Washington Commanders, who started the season as the oldest team and will finish the season limping to an unsatisfying finish. On the other hand, and on Monday night the other sideline, there’s Philip Rivers, 44, who returned from retirement to nearly save the Colts.

In his second start since coming off his couch, Rivers played better than many of his younger teammates, especially those on the defensive unit. Despite Rivers tossing several wobbly, underthrown balls and a pick-six in the fourth quarter, he still showed a mastery of the Colts’ offense by amassing 277 passing yards and two touchdowns.

“I’m torn on how to express it, because it’s been a blast,” Rivers said following his second straight loss as the starting quarterback and the Colts’ fifth consecutive defeat. “It’s been a blast to prepare and to go stinkin’ get ready and go out there and warm up and do all that with these guys again.”

A performance like the one Rivers had can justify why Colts Coach Shane Steichen would look past rookie quarterback Riley Leonard and dial up his 44-year-old buddy in Alabama. There’s no replacement for veteran leadership. And ahead of this season, the 49ers had a locker room that needed to learn from its leaders.

“Guys are coming out of college, [and] you can kind of lose track of where you are in the moment, especially with such a long schedule,” said center Jake Brendel, who has played five of his eight NFL seasons with the 49ers. “And then just another part was just, let’s not focus on stuff that’s not under our control right now. Let’s just focus on the stuff that’s here now, the stuff that’s in front of us and make sure we optimize that, and every single week, we just go into Sunday or Monday night and execute the game plan to the best of our abilities.”

Even with veterans such as ­16-year offensive lineman Trent Williams and Juszczyk, who’s 13 years in, the 49ers can still act and look young. Inside the Lucas Oil Stadium visiting locker room after this victory, Juszczyk changed into his clothes, dressing near Christian McCaffrey’s locker - where a speaker blasted Eddy Grant’s “Electric Avenue” and Juszczyk sang along to the chorus. (He’s old enough to rock with the ’80s.) On his other side, two teammates propped up a cellphone and recorded themselves doing a viral dance. Surely they had no choreography planned for Simon & Garfunkel’s “Mrs. Robinson,” the next oldie on McCaffrey’s playlist.

So, yeah. Shanahan must’ve recognized early on that his team didn’t need to hear all that heavy talk about the Super Bowl. Rather, he wanted his leaders to echo his message to take it one week at a time.

“I think he did a great job of framing it in the way that this team’s going to look a lot different than it has in years prior and we’re going to have to rely on a lot of young guys,” Juszczyk said. “But the way we kind of shifted that, us as vets, in order for us to get to where we want to go, we’re going to have to bring those young guys along with us. And we’re going to have to help those guys grow up really quick and make sure that they would be able to contribute and help us win.”

Over the summer, the 49ers enjoyed their steak and sashimi. (“It was a fantastic dinner,” Brendel echoed.) Now that they have clinched a postseason berth, they can chew on something more.

“[Sunday] night was the first time that we really acknowledged that this team can go win a Super Bowl,” Juszczyk said. “There was no denying we are a playoff team - that just is a cold hard fact. I felt like that gave Kyle the confidence to really say, ‘Hey, let’s go for it.’”