RED-HOT RODGERS LEADS PACKERS PAST RaIDERS
Green Bay quarterback blows game open with five touchdown passes
Aaron Rodgers threw five touchdown passes as the Green Bay Packers capped their fifth home game in seven weeks with a 42-24 dismantling of the Oakland Raiders on Sunday.
Green Bay improved to 6-1 under first-year coach Matt LaFleur behind the biggest game of the season from Rodgers.
When he hit Marquez Valdes-Scantling for a 74-yard touchdown midway through the fourth quarter, Rodgers had six total touchdowns compared to six incompletions and a perfect 158.3 passer rating. He wound up completing 25 of 31 passes for 429 yards.
The Raiders (3-3), in the middle of a six-week stretch without a game in Oakland, were doomed by a porous pass defence and miserable red-zone offence in losing after their bye.
The game swung late in the first half. With Green Bay having just taken a 14-10 lead, the Raiders motored into scoring position on a 48-yard catch by tight end Darren Waller to the 3.
On second-and-goal at the 2, Raiders quarterback Derek Carr lunged headfirst to the goal-line with the ball extended. Before his knee hit the turf, Carr lost the ball, and it bounced out of the end zone, resulting in a turnover and touchback for the Packers.
Green Bay took advantage with a touchdown and potential 14-point swing on Rodgers’ 37-yard touchdown pass to Jake Kumerow with 12 seconds left in the half.
Kumerow caught the ball at the 11 and somehow kept his balance along the sideline.
The Packers got the ball back to start the second half and wasted no time in adding to their lead.
On the first play from scrimmage, Rodgers hit Valdes-Scantling for a gain of 59, setting up the quarterback’s three-yard touchdown run that extended the lead to 28-10.
After the Raiders pulled within 28-17 on a seven-yard TD catch by Waller, Rodgers struck again.
He started the drive with a 25-yard pass to tight end Jimmy Graham and capped it with a threeyard touchdown pass to Graham.
The 74-yard scoring pass to Valdes-Scantling, on which the second-year receiver slipped a tackle by cornerback Gareon Conley and ran untouched the final 69 yards, gave Rodgers five touchdown passes for the first time since Sept. 28, 2015, against Kansas City.
Rookie running back Josh Jacobs (21 carries, 124 rushing yards) and Waller (seven receptions, 126 yards, two touchdowns) had huge days for the Raiders, who produced 484 total yards but went just 3 of 6 on scoring when reaching the red zone.
Arizona running back Chase Edmonds had career highs with 126 rushing yards and three touchdowns, and quarterback Kyler Murray set an NFL record for most completions in the first seven games of a career as the Cardinals held off the New York Giants 27-21 on Sunday in rainy East Rutherford, N.J.
Edmonds scored on two 20-yard runs four minutes apart in the first quarter as the Cardinals took a 17-0 lead, and his 22-yard run made it 24-14 with six minutes left in the third quarter as the Cardinals (3-3-1) won a third straight game for the first time since 2015.
Daniel Jones completed 22 of 35 passes for 223 yards and with one touchdown and one interception, and Saquon Barkley rushed for 72 yards and a touchdown on 18 carries in his return from injury for the Giants (2-5), who have lost three in a row.
Murray completed 14 of 21 passes for 104 yards. His completion to Pharoh Cooper in the final minute of the first quarter was his 162nd of the season, breaking the league record set by the Philadelphia Eagles’ Nick Foles in 2012.
Murray finished the game with 167 completions.
Rookie quarterback Gardner Minshew threw for 255 yards and the go-ahead touchdown as the visiting Jacksonville Jaguars rallied for a 27-17 win over the winless Cincinnati Bengals.
Minshew, who completed 15 of 32 passes, found Keelan Cole for a two-yard score with 12:45 left in the game and then converted a two-point pass to give Jacksonville a 17-10 lead. Yannick Ngakoue put the game away with a 23-yard interception return score with 4:25 remaining.
Jacksonville scored 18 points in the fourth quarter to seal the win.
Andy Dalton hit on 22 of 43 passes for 276 yards with a touchdown and three interceptions for the Bengals (0-7).
Jacoby Brissett completed 26 of 39 passes for a career-high 326 yards and four touchdowns to lead the Colts to a 30-23 win over the Houston Texans in a battle for first in the AFC South.
The Texans (4-3) closed within 28-23 on a four-yard touchdown pass from Deshaun Watson to DeAndre Hopkins with 6:38 left.
With under three minutes left and forced to punt from its own end zone, Houston elected to take a safety, conceding two points when punter Bryan Anger ran out of the back of the end zone to make it 30-23 with 2:44 remaining.