NFC North

The **National Football Conference – Northern Division** or **NFC North** is one of the four divisions of the National Football Conference (NFC) in the National Football League (NFL). Nicknamed the "**Black and Blue Division**" for the rough and tough rivalry games between the teams, it currently has four members: the Chicago Bears, Detroit Lions, Green Bay Packers, and Minnesota Vikings. The NFC North was previously known as the **NFC Central** from 1970 to 2001. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers were previously members, from 1977, one year after they joined the league as an expansion team, until 2002 when they moved to the NFC South.

The division was created in 1967 as the **Central Division** of the NFL's Eastern Conference and existed for three seasons before the AFL–NFL merger. After the merger, it was renamed the NFC Central and retained that name until the NFL split into eight divisions in 2002. The four current division teams have been together in the same division or conference since the Vikings joined the league in 1961. The Bears, Lions (known as the Portsmouth Spartans until 1934) and Packers have been in the same division or conference since the NFL began a conference format in 1933. Largely because the four teams have played each other at least twice a year, with the exception of the strike-shortened 1982 season, for more than 60 years (more than 80 years in the case of the Bears, Lions and Packers), the entire division is considered one very large rivalry.

The division has a total of five Super Bowl wins. The Packers have won four and the Bears one, with the most recent happening at the conclusion of the 2010 season. Of the ten NFL teams with the highest winning percentage throughout their respective franchise histories, three of them are in the NFC North (the Packers, the Bears, and the Vikings). Conversely, the Lions have one of the lowest winning percentages in the NFL, including the first winless 16-game season in NFL history, in 2008. The division has the second-longest active Super Bowl drought, only ahead of the AFC South. Since 2010, the division has lost the conference championship five times (four for the Packers and one for the Vikings)

The Packers hold an overall regular season record of 763–577–38 with an overall playoff record of 35–23, four Super Bowl titles in five Super Bowl appearances, and nine pre-Super Bowl league titles. The Bears hold an overall regular season record of 774–596–42 with an overall playoff record of 17–19, one Super Bowl title in two Super Bowl appearances, and eight pre-Super Bowl league titles. The Vikings hold an overall regular season record of 492–409–11 with an overall playoff record of 21–30, no Super Bowl titles in four Super Bowl appearances, and one pre-Super Bowl league title. The Lions hold an overall regular season record of 566–677–33 with an overall playoff record of 7-13, and four pre-Super Bowl league titles. They have yet to appear in a Super Bowl.

The division earned the moniker "Black and Blue Division" due to its intense rivalries and physical style of play, and this nickname is still used regularly today. It is also known as the "Frostbite Division" as all teams played home games in late season winter cold until the mid-1970s. The division is also humorously called the "Frozen North", although Detroit has played its home games indoors since 1975, and Minnesota also did so from 1982 to 2013 and returned to indoor home games at U.S. Bank Stadium in 2016.

ESPN sportscaster Chris Berman often refers to this division as the "NFC Norris" because of its geographical similarity to the National Hockey League's former Norris Division, although in a twist of irony the NHL dropped the *Norris* name in favor of *Central* almost a decade before the NFL dropped the *Central* name in favor of *North.*