BALTIMORE — Patrick Queen just smiled and referred to his kicker as “Automatuck.” Calais Campbell shook his head and said, “Justin Tucker. What a legend.”
After matter-of-factly drilling a 58-yard field goal earlier in the game, Tucker hit a 43-yard field goal as time expired to give the Ravens a 19-17 win against the Cincinnati Bengals at M&T Bank Stadium on Oct. 9 and vault the Ravens into the AFC North lead.
The Bengals (2-3) had gone ahead with 1:58 left when Joe Burrow capped a 13-play, 75-yard drive by powering over the goal line on a 1-yard quarterback sneak and kicker Evan McPherson converted the ensuing extra-point kick for a 17-16 Bengals lead.
It appeared the Ravens might be headed for their third straight demoralizing loss at home this season, but quarterback Lamar Jackson, who had struggled at times with his accuracy, instead took over the game with his legs, running the Ravens into field-goal range for Tucker’s 19th career game-winning kick.
As they had in their previous two home games this year, the Ravens (3-2) started strong, taking a 10-0 lead early in the second quarter when Jackson found Mark Andrews all alone for an 11-yard touchdown. But as they have done in their previous two home games, the Ravens lost the lead, this time by halftime, and McPherson’s 40-yard field goal tied the game at 10 just ahead of the intermission.
Tucker hit a pair of field goals in the second half prior to his game-winner, including one from 58 yards, to give the Ravens a 16-10 lead, and the Ravens’ defense came up with a huge goal-line stand in between those two kicks, stuffing the Bengals on fourth-and-goal from the Ravens’ 2-yard line when the Bengals, like the Ravens last week, opted to play for the touchdown rather than the short field goal.
Tucker’s 25-yard field goal extended the Ravens lead to 16-10, but then the Bengals mounted what looked like it might be the game-winning drive.
Not this time. Jackson and Tucker made sure of that.
Here are five quick impressions of the win, which improves the Ravens record to 19-2 in home primetime games under head coach John Harbaugh:
1. Justin Tucker might be the most clutch player the league has ever seen.
Lamar Jackson said he had complete confidence in Justin Tucker on the final kick, “But I still prayed.”
No need, really. Tucker’s performance in late-game situations remains infallible, as he is seemingly immune to the pressure of the moment, or he just thrives on it.
Tucker has hit 60 consecutive field goals in the fourth quarter or overtime, the longest such streak in NFL history, and he is 22-for-22 in his career on field-goal kicks in the final minute of regulation or overtime. These aren’t exactly chip shots, either.
Of Tucker’s 19 game-winning kicks, five have been from 52 yards or longer, including the NFL-record 66-yarder he hit to beat Detroit last season. Thirteen of his game-winners, including the one in this game, have been from beyond 40 yards.
Every week, it seems a close game is decided by the failure of a kicker in a late-game situation, and it happened again in Week 5 when Cleveland’s Cade York missed a 54-yard try in the closing seconds of a 30-28 loss to the Los Angeles Chargers.
With the Ravens, and Justin Tucker, that just never happens.
“The guy’s clutch,” defensive end Calais Campbell said. “This is what he does.”
2. Lamar Jackson wasn’t at his best, but his singular talents took over the game at the end.
Lamar Jackson has surely had better days throwing the ball. His second-quarter interception, when he overthrew Demarcus Robinson, seemed to awaken the Bengals, who proceeded to rally from a 10-0 hole to tie the game at 10 by halftime.
Then in the third quarter, Jackson missed two good chances for a long touchdown pass. On the Ravens’ opening series of the third quarter, he launched a deep ball for Devin Duvernay, who had step on the Bengals’ secondary, but the pass was overthrown. Two plays later, the Ravens opted to go for the first down on fourth-and-3 from the Bengals’ 41. Some misdirection seemed to cross up the Bengals, and Tylan Wallace was all alone down the right sideline but Jackson overthrew him by several yards.
It looked like those missed chances might loom large, though Jackson later made a couple of big throws to Mark Andrews on what proved to be a 15-play, 91-yard drive that ended with Tucker’s 25-yard field goal for a 16-10 lead. Jackson finished 19-for-32 for 174 yards, with a pedestrian passer rating of 71.6.
But with the game on the line, when an MVP quarterback is supposed to take over the game, Jackson did that, in the way that really only Jackson can.
On the Ravens’ final drive, Jackson completed two short passes to Andrews (8 catches, 89 yards) and then carried on four designed runs, the biggest going for 19 yards and moving the Ravens into field-goal range. Jackson, who finished with a team-high 58 yards on 12 carries, carried two more times to move the ball to the Bengals’ 25 and set up Tucker’s game-winner.
“There’s nobody like Lamar,” head coach John Harbaugh said. “There are great quarterbacks, and you can’t take away anything from some of the great quarterbacks in this league, and he’s in that group. I’ll take him over everybody. … He does it his way, and he just wants to win.”
3. Embarrassed by Cincinnati last year, the Ravens’ defense responded in a big way.
Calais Campbell said players didn’t even watch tape of last year’s games against the Bengals — a 41-17 Bengals rout in Baltimore, and a 41-21 Bengals rout in Cincinnati. Marlon Humphrey and other players said this week that they didn’t want to talk about last year’s games.
But after this one was over, linebacker Patrick Queen let it be known that, well, of course those two beatdowns were on their minds.
“It motivates us a lot,” Queen said. “We lost those games in tough fashion, and everything that came with it, all the talking after, all the letdown we had from each other, it all built up to now.”
Queen, who had dropped two potential interceptions in the last two weeks, picked off Burrow, his former LSU teammate, to set up Tucker’s 58-yard field goal, and the secondary that was so torched by Burrow and his receiver corps last year kept them largely in check.
Ja’Marr Chase, who had 201 receiving yards in the Bengals’ win in Baltimore last season, was held to 50 yards on seven catches. Tyler Boyd was limited to three catches for 32 yards. Tee Higgins, who had 194 receiving yards in their romp against the Ravens in Cincinnati, was sidelined early by an ankle injury and did not have a catch. The player who did the most damage through the air for the Bengals was former Ravens tight end Hayden Hurst, who finished with six catches for 53 yards and caught Burrow’s only touchdown pass.
But the Ravens did a great job preventing plays like last year, when Chase took a quick slant, broke two tackles and sped 82 yards for a score. The Ravens’ tackling was stronger all night, beginning with Peters dropping Chase for no gain on the second play of the game. Cornerbacks Peters, Marlon Humphrey, Brandon Stephens and Damarion “Pepe” Williams all did a good job containing the receivers. That proved to be especially important because starting safety Marcus Williams left with what John Harbaugh later announced was a dislocated wrist.
“I thought our corners did a great job,” Harbaugh said. “They had a few catches, but we had a number of plays, too, so I was just proud of all the guys.”
Peters, who was questionable to play because of quad injury suffered in practice this week, showed no ill effects and finished with five tackles. His swagger game was going strong all night, too; he and Chase spent plenty of time jawing at each other.
Peters also came up with one of the biggest plays of the game, sniffing out a Bengals trick play near the Ravens’ goal line. On second-and-goal from the 2, the Bengals ran what was supposed to be a double reverse pass by Boyd. Peters sniffed it out and dropped Boyd for a sack back at the 14-yard line.
“It was just a great football play,” Harbaugh said. “It really wasn’t a designed piece of what we were doing. Marcus just made a great football play.”
Two plays later, the Ravens blew up a fourth-down shovel pass by Burrow to keep the Bengals scoreless on that drive.
The Ravens didn’t want to talk about the two games with the Bengals last year, but clearly the memory of them fueled their effort in this one.
4. Devin Duvernay has become an integral part of the offense.
With wide receiver Rashod Bateman (foot) and running back Justice Hill (hamstring) sidelined, the Ravens needed someone else to step up as an offensive spark, and Devin Duvernay did that in multiple ways.
Offensive coordinator Greg Roman, who in the past two years has seemed reluctant to get Duvernay overly involved in the offense, opened up his Duvernay vault in this one. Duvernay caught passes, he ran the ball on a jet sweep, and he even lined up tailback a couple of times, taking off on what looked like a traditional running play and picking up 12 yards. And Duvernay would have caught a long touchdown pass had Lamar Jackson not overthrown him, because the speedy Duvernay had gotten behind the Bengals’ defense.
Duvernay finished with a career-high five catches for 54 yards, which tied a career high, and he ran three times for 24 yards. He also remains an All-Pro return specialist.
The questions about the depth of the wide receiver group are valid; beyond Bateman and Duvernay, the other receivers have done little, and even in this game, with Bateman unavailable,, Demarcus Robinson (1-8), Tylan Wallace (1-8) and James Proche (1-7) combined for three catches and 31 yards.
Duvernay, though, pronounced in the season opener against the New York Jets, when he caught a pair of touchdown passes, that he was ready to be a bigger part of this offense. He has hardly slowed, and his work as an occasional tailback in this game adds another wrinkle to one of the team’s most versatile playmakers.
5. The Ravens are the team to beat in the AFC North.
The winner of this game, by virtue of Cleveland’s loss to the Los Angeles Chargers earlier in the day, was going to be all alone in first place in the AFC North. It feels especially important that the Ravens held serve and won at home, because the way this division is shaping up, the regular-season finale at Cincinnati could have the division title in the balance.
Sure, there’s a lot of football between now and then, and the first five weeks have revealed that every AFC North team has flaws.
The Bengals have a receiver group that Ravens fans would swoon over, but the offensive line can’t block and for all that firepower, they have been held to 20 points or less in three of their first five games. The Browns (2-3) are scuffling, and waiting for suspended quarterback Deshaun Watson to hit the field later in the season, and the Pittsburgh Steelers (1-4) are having growing pains with a rookie quarterback, though their Week 1 upset win at Cincinnati could loom large in the playoff race.
The Ravens know that it’s a week-to-week league, and the viewpoint on one Monday can look a lot different the next Monday, but despite two disastrous collapses at home, they have so far shown to be the AFC North’s most complete team.
“Nobody’s going to win the division in October,” John Harbaugh said, “but these games are going to go a long way at the end of the season.”
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