Chiefs dominate Colts; will play for AFC title
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — This is where it was supposed to go wrong. This is where the Chiefs bid to host their first AFC Championship would start to slip away.
Sammy Watkins, playing in his first game in nearly two months, caught his sixth pass of the day with a minute left in the third quarter. On his way down, though, Watkins lost the ball as Colts linebacker Darius Leonard knocked it loose and then snatched it out from under Watkins.
Down just three scores, the Colts were now on the 20-yard line. The collapse could start now.
But this is another year and another time.
This time, things broke the Chiefs’ way in the 31-13 win against the Colts. It was like decades of karma finally came back around and helped the Chiefs break the cycle of sadness that’s plagued them for the better part of 25 years.
The Colts had the ball for all of two plays before Justin Houston and Dee Ford combined to write their own history and break from the tradition of the past.
Ford sacked Luck at the 20, freeing the ball in the process, and Houston recovered it. Chiefs ball, Chiefs game. There was still another quarter to play, 15 more minutes for the worst to happen. But it didn’t.
“I know the city has been waiting a long time for this opportunity,” Houston said.
Indeed. And now, an AFC
Championship Game — and a chance to avenge one of their four losses — against the winner of Sunday’s PatriotsChargers game awaits the Chiefs next week.
Surrounded by more than 76,000 souls filled with nervous energy, the Chiefs came out calm and collected from the opening coin toss. With snow flurries swirling over Arrowhead and piles of the white stuff piled against the retaining walls surrounding the field, the Chiefs executed a game plan that’s worked since early in the season.
Like they did the first nine weeks of the season, Chiefs won the coin toss and deferred. And like many of those times, the defense got off the field quickly, forcing the Colts into the first of four consecutive three-and-outs. Keenan Allen said. “I didn’t know what was going on. It just felt like, I don’t know, we couldn’t do anything right. Bad day.”
The Chargers advanced to the step before the AFC title game on the strength of their road success, winning the nine times they played outside of Southern California.
Along the way, they came back from double-digit deficits in Pittsburgh and Kansas City, and won everywhere from Seattle to London. They adopted “Any Squad, Any Place” as their motto of fearlessness.
But a season that continually offered glimpses of possibly being something special ultimately ended up in shreds thanks to the ruthless precision of quarterback Tom Brady and the Patriots.
“They jumped out on us,” running back Melvin Gordon said. “And they just kept attacking and kept attacking and kept attacking. It’s hard to win when they’re scoring 35 in the first half.”
Each of New England’s first four possessions resulted in touchdowns against a defense that missed assignments and tackles and could find nothing close to a solution for Brady.
The Chargers’ “7-Eleven” scheme that worked so well in beating Baltimore a week ago in the wild-card round was a disaster against the Patriots’ pounding running game and subsequent play-action passing.