Tagovailoa, Hill rally Dolphins by Chargers
QB tallies 466 yards, late touchdown drive
INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Tua Tagovailoa might have shocked some observers by putting up one of the best passing days in an opener in NFL history.
His coach wasn’t surprised at all. “It was validating for me, because I don’t feel crazy. That’s kind of what I expected to happen,” coach Mike Mcdaniel said after the Miami Dolphins rallied for a 36-34 victory over the Los Angeles Chargers on Sunday.
Tagovailoa threw for 466 yards, the fourth most in an opener, and three touchdowns. In a game that saw two ties and nine lead changes, his 4-yard throw to Tyreek Hill in the right corner of the end zone with 1:45 remaining put the Dolphins ahead to stay.
“I was super excited to be out there again,” said Tagovailoa, who completed 28 of 45 passes. “It’s the first game. You don’t necessarily know what to expect from their team. They give us their best shot. They ran almost everything that we’ve seen watching film. So it feels good.”
Hill, who said during training camp he wants to be the first receiver to reach 2,000 yards in a season, got off to a great start. He had 215 yards — the third-best total in Week 1 in league history — on 11 receptions and two touchdowns.
“I wanted to play fast and deliberate. I kind of went into a zone there,” said Hill, who had his third 200-yard receiving game. “Even during halftime, Tua was getting guys going. He leaned on me a little bit toward the end and that meant more targets.”
Hill had two receptions on the decisive 8-play, 75-yard drive. On third-and-10 from the Dolphins 25, he beat Ja’sir Taylor on a go route and caught a 47-yard pass after Tagovailoa stepped up in the pocket and made a pinpoint throw.
Tagovailoa’s 466 passing yards were the most ever allowed by the Chargers, and Miami’s 536 yards of offense is the most the franchise has yielded in an opener.
“I don’t think that we played the right leverages in the secondary and I didn’t think that we rushed the quarterback effectively enough,” coach Brandon Staley said. “It turned into a track meet in the passing game.”
Chargers edge rusher Khalil Mack blamed the defense for the loss, but also acknowledged the brilliance of Tagovailoa and Hill.
“I feel like it’s a rare occasion when you’ve got two guys like that on the field at the same time, blazing up and down the field,” Mack said. “We’ve just got to look at it and get better, make sure we get better on the back end and the front end.”