Last night at Levi’s Stadium, we watched two teams that fought their way through an entire season to earn their spot on football’s biggest stage. But when the lights were brightest, only one team kept the power on.
The Seattle Seahawks defeated the New England Patriots 29-13 in a masterclass of defensive execution. That said, the scoreline tells only part of the story.
Here’s what stuck with me beyond the final score: while the Patriots did go scoreless through three quarters, it wasn’t talent that failed them. It was execution when it mattered most. Small gaps became catastrophic in an environment with zero margin for error.
When Critical Infrastructure Breaks Down
During halftime, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, better known as Bad Bunny, made history as the first Latino solo artist to headline the Super Bowl, performing almost entirely in Spanish. It was a moment of genuine cultural significance, a celebration of Latin music and identity on one of the world’s biggest stages.
Fresh off winning Album of the Year at the 2026 Grammys for “DeBÍ& TiRAR MáS FOToS,” Benito brought that same energy to Levi’s Stadium. The album itself wrestles with holding onto home when what anchors you (from infrastructure to community) starts slipping away. Among last night’s setlist was “El Apagón” (The Blackout), a song that carries this theme forward.
The song celebrates Puerto Rico while simultaneously acknowledging its struggles, holding both truths at once. You can love your home fiercely while refusing to stay silent about the systems that are failing it. When Benito performed it last night, backed by live brass and the Puerto Rican flag, he was giving voice to the reality: the rolling power outages that have plagued Puerto Rico since Hurricane Maria and the infrastructure that keeps breaking down while people keep finding ways to survive.
For anyone who’s witnessed infrastructure collapse, the message landed: you can honor where you’re from while demanding the systems that serve your community work.
Why IT Infrastructure Fails Under Pressure
Infrastructure failures rarely announce themselves. They accumulate. A patch that doesn’t get applied. An access control that’s “temporarily” loosened. A backup that’s never actually tested. An AI tool deployed without proper data governance. A continuity plan that looks great on paper but hasn’t been stress-tested against real scenarios.
According to Gartner research, 90% of cloud-based availability issues stem from the failure to fully use redundancy capabilities—not from catastrophic events, but from overlooked configuration gaps. Exactly what happened to the Patriots last night. When pressure mounted, small cracks became complete fractures.
What Happens When Your Systems Face Real Pressure
Seattle’s defense executed a plan. They knew Drake Maye was a talent, so they disrupted his timing, collapsed the pocket, and forced him into decisions he didn’t want to make. That’s not luck. That’s preparation meeting opportunity. Infrastructure creates the foundation, but performance determines the outcome.
For IT leaders and decision-makers, this is the question: when your systems face pressure (a cyberattack, a compliance audit, an AI deployment, a technology migration), do you have the infrastructure to execute, or are you hoping nothing breaks?
Hoping isn’t a strategy. In a world where attacks are more sophisticated, regulatory requirements are tightening, and technology complexity is increasing, you can’t afford to discover infrastructure gaps when the game is already on the line.
Building Infrastructure That Holds When It Matters
Benito closed his halftime performance by spiking a football that read “Together we are America” while the jumbotron displayed: “The only thing more powerful than hate is love.”
Lo único más poderoso que el odio, es el amor. The Only Thing More Powerful Than Hate is Love. @sanbenito#AppleMusicHalftimepic.twitter.com/0VDQlSjet9
— NFL (@NFL) February 9, 2026
It was a statement about belonging and about the infrastructure (cultural, social, technical) that keeps the lights on for all of us.
That message resonates especially during Black History Month, as we recognize the infrastructure builders who’ve always understood this truth. Pioneers like Garrett Morgan, whose traffic signal invention brought order to chaotic intersections, or Dr. Mark Dean, whose computing innovations made technology accessible to millions. They built systems that had to work for everyone, even when they themselves faced exclusion from the industries they were transforming. Infrastructure isn’t just technical. It’s about who gets to participate, who gets protected, and whether the systems we build actually serve the communities that depend on them.
That’s what resilient infrastructure looks like.
