How Can I Adopt The Puppy Bowl Puppies?

On Feb. 9, viewers across the country will tune in to the most important athletic event of the year — and they might stick around to watch the Super Bowl, too.

Puppy Bowl XXI marks the 21st year of adoptable dogs competing against each other on a pup-sized field. The prize is technically the Lombarky Trophy (a riff on the Super Bowl’s Vince Lombardi Trophy). But really, every player on Team Ruff and Team Fluff wins something even better: a home of their own.

Indeed, CNN reports that every Puppy Bowl participant in the game’s two-decade history has been adopted. This year, Animal Planet promises more pups than ever before: 142 players from 80 shelters, to be exact.

A few of the adorable athletes include Team Fluff’s Smoosh, an aptly named Pekingese (a first-time breed for the game), and Team Ruff’s Demure, a Cairn terrier who’s “ready to bring the energy to the stadium AND is always looking to make new friends. As long as they’re very cutesy and very mindful, of course!” (BRB, crying.) There are also 11 amazing special-needs pups to root for — or perhaps welcome to the family?

Speaking of which...

Want To Adopt A Player?

The great thing about the Puppy Bowl is that the roster is filled with dogs looking for a good home. There’s one tiny caveat, though.

Unlike the Super Bowl, the Puppy Bowl isn’t a live event — in fact, it typically films in October. “By the time the Puppy Bowl actually airs, most of these puppies have already found their forever homes,” rufferee Dan Schachner told Mental Floss.

Granted, that’s a pretty good problem to have! That happened to a notable Puppy Bowl player from 2022, Team Fluff’s Irwin. By the time the three-legged rescue from Puerto Rico charmed viewers on TV, he had been adopted by the actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan via The Sato Project. The Walking Dead star wrote, “Make no mistake... he did the choosing.”

The bottom line? If you’re ready to open your heart and home to a new dog, the Puppy Bowl can help you. In his interview with Mental Floss, Schachner said you should visit the Animal Planet website while you watch the game. “And if you see a puppy that you fall in love with, check him out,” he explained. “They may be adoptable. And if not, that shelter will have other puppies who are equally adorable, maybe even from the same litter.”

Want another fun way to help the puppies? Check out this year’s Puppy Bowl partners, including Best Friends Animal Society, which is covering adoption fees for pets at Best Friends Lifesaving Centers across the country through Feb. 12.

As a reminder, you can watch the big game (before the other big game) on TV at 2 p.m. ET via Animal Planet, Discovery, TBS, or TruTv, or stream via Max or Discovery+.