Taylor Swift is hardly the first singer to date one of the most popular men in the NFL. Carrie Underwood made it cool in 2007, but a country legend had America's quarterback on her arm in the early '90s.

Underwood wasn't far removed from American Idol when, in 2007, she started dating Tony Romo. He was the quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys (find him calling football games for CBS these days), and this relationship would be the first of two to put him front page of tabloids across America.

A romance with pop star Jessica Simpson followed. When the Cowboys would play away games, opposing fans would troll him and distract him.

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Why Did Tony Romo and Carrie Underwood Break Up?

Romowood are said to have started dating in 2006, and we can confirm it lasted through at least spring of 2007, because that's when they walked the red carpet together at the ACM Awards. She's never said why they split, but later she'd tell Esquire that he was more into football than her.

Asked if she'd ever write a song about him, Underwood shot back with, "No. I would never immortalize a guy that did me wrong. I would never give him that much credit."

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Scroll down to learn who the other country star to date an NFL quarterback was. That relationship didn't last, either — in fact, only three of the nine country singer and athlete romances we could find remain today. For Underwood, the second go-round with an athlete meant happily ever after.

However, the odds, it seems, may be stacked against Swift and Travis Kelce.

Romo would eventually marry Candice Crawford in 2011. Underwood is now married to former NHL player Mike Fisher.

9 Country Stars Who Dated + Married Pro Athletes

We’re not going to say every relationship involving a country singer and a professional athlete is doomed, but the odds of true love lasting aren’t great. 

Here are nine country singer/athlete couples. Seven went to the altar, and of those seven, just three survive today. A high-profile divorce is a more common result of this kind of relationship, but for the sake of our romantic heart, we’ll admit the sample size is very, very small. 

18 Celebrity Country Couples You Probably Forgot About

Carrie Underwood is a part of this list, twice! So too is Keith Urban, Brad Paisley and Dwight Yoakam. See all the celebrity country couples that once were, until they broke up.

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