PHOENIX — For the first 35 years of its existence, you may recall, the Lamar Hunt Trophy annually bestowed upon the AFC champion had never so much as been displayed in Kansas City. Chances are some Chiefs fans didn’t even know what it was.

That distinction would be depressing enough for any AFC competitor.

But it stood as particularly mocking to the Chiefs, founded in Dallas and moved to Kansas City by the brilliant and revolutionary Hunt, but since 1970 unable to replicate their essential place in the NFL’s early Super Bowl history.

So when the Chiefs played host to the dynastic Patriots in the AFC Championship Game on Jan. 20, 2019, part of the cultural contrast in the leadup was the trophy having become so commonplace for the Patriots that coach Bill Belichick had tended to just fling it aside — like one of my nephews did with one too many bobblehead gifts a few Christmases ago.

The Chiefs couldn’t reel it in that day, falling in overtime in another form of playoff heartbreaker.

But that first full season with Patrick Mahomes portended an infinitely brighter future, one that has included the Chiefs winning three of the next four Hunt trophies to earn more Super Bowl berths in four years than in their entire previous history.

And this one’s about making a different sort of history.

On Sunday, they landed in Phoenix for a final week of preparation to take on the Philadelphia Eagles on Feb. 12 in Super Bowl LVII, making for a full-circle arrival back where they began the season with a 44-21 victory over the Cardinals.

“We kind of hit on (that) in training camp,” linebacker Nick Bolton said last week. “On how blessed (we are) with the opportunity to start and end at the same place and (how) it’s about everything that we do in between to get to there.”

The in-between was a 14-3 regular season and playoff wins over the Jaguars and Bengals, who had beaten the Chiefs three times in a row, including last season’s AFC title game.

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