BALTIMORE — Zay Flowers lunged for the end zone, inches away from sending the M&T Bank Stadium crowd into a frenzy and reinvigorating a stagnant Ravens offense. Instead, Flowers had the ball punched out of his hands, and it bounced into the end zone, where the Kansas City Chiefs recovered for a touchback.
With that, the biggest of three Ravens turnovers, their hopes for a Super Bowl bid all but bounced away as well.
Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes engineered two early touchdown drives, and that proved to be enough as the visiting Chiefs upset the top-seeded Ravens, 17-10, in the AFC championship game on Jan. 28.
A game that pitted two of the game’s most dynamic quarterbacks in Mahomes and the Ravens’ Lamar Jackson instead was dictated by the defense. The Ravens held Mahomes and the Chiefs scoreless in the second half, but they could not make up a 10-point halftime deficit because of turnovers and poor offensive execution against a relentless Chiefs defense.
“We had some opportunities out there,” Jackson said. “We’ve just got to take advantage of them. Can’t turn the ball over.”
It proved to be a thoroughly deflating afternoon for a rabid Baltimore crowd on hand for the city’s first AFC championship game since Jan. 3, 1971. It was the Ravens’ first AFC championship game appearance since their Super Bowl season of 2012.
The crowd featured several legendary Ravens including Hall of Famers Jonathan Ogden, Ray Lewis and Ed Reed; Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps and Orioles legend Adam Jones, among others.
But the crowd was essentially taken out of the game by Mahomes early and the Chiefs’ defense late.
Playing in his sixth straight AFC championship game, but his first on the road, Mahomes operated with surgical precision early. He went 10-for-10 in the first quarter and led the Chiefs to a 17-7 halftime lead with two long, sustained drives.
Mahomes finished 30-for-39 for 241 yards, and he has now thrown 11 touchdowns and no interceptions in his past six playoff games.
Mahomes threw five straight completions on the Chiefs’ opening drive. He hit tight end Travis Kelce for 13 yards on fourth-and-2 to keep the drive alive, and three plays later, he and Kelce connected on a 19-yard touchdown and a quick 7-0 Chiefs lead.
The Ravens answered when Jackson lofted a 30-yard touchdown pass to Flowers with 4:58 left in the first quarter after Jackson wiggled out of the grasp of Chiefs linebacker Leo Chenal.
Mahomes, though, again drove the Chiefs through the heart of the Ravens’ vaunted defense on a 75-yard drive that ended with a 2-yard touchdown run by Isiah Pacheco that gave the Chiefs the lead for good at 14-7 with 10:56 left in the first half.
The Ravens’ first turnover came on their next possession. Jackson was strip-sacked by Charles Omenihu, giving the ball to the Chiefs at the Ravens’ 33-yard line. But the Ravens’ defense held, with Kyle Hamilton and Travis Jones stuffing Pacheco for no gain on fourth-and-inches at the Ravens 13-yard line.
That proved to be a theme for the Ravens’ defense, which surrendered just three points the rest of the way.
Yet each time the Ravens got the ball back with a chance to cut into the Chiefs’ lead, they ran into trouble. They nearly reached field-goal range midway through the third quarter before being pushed back by a penalty and a sack by blitzing safety Justin Reid.
The Ravens threatened again on their next drive after Jackson lofted a deep pass to Flowers for 54 yards, but then Flowers was flagged 15 yards for taunting as he stood over cornerback L’Jarius Sneed after the catch. Four plays later, Sneed got the last laugh as he stripped the ball from Flowers inches from the goal line and the Chiefs’ Trent McDuffie recovered for a touchback.
Flowers said he thought he had crossed the plane of the goal line, but replays showed he lost control of the ball short of the goal line.
“I’ll learn from my mistakes,” said Flowers, who led the Ravens with five catches for 115 yards.
Then starting from their own 1-yard line after a Chiefs punt, the Ravens moved 74 yards, 39 of them coming on a pass from Jackson to Nelson Agholor. But two plays later, Jackson sailed a pass down the middle intended for tight end Isaiah Likely, but the Chiefs had Likely essentially triple-covered and Deon Bush intercepted the pass in the end zone.
The Ravens got a 43-yard field goal from Justin Tucker on their next possession, then couldn’t get a defensive stop.
With the clock winding down to the two-minute warning and the Ravens out of timeouts, Mahomes lofted a perfectly placed deep pass to Marquez Valdes-Scantling for 32 yards, and with that, the Ravens could only watch as the clock ran out on their season.
Here are five quick impressions of the game, which moves the Ravens to 1-3 in championship game appearances under John Harbaugh:
1. The demise of the Chiefs was greatly exaggerated.
The Chiefs had lost three out of four games in one stretch of December, the offense was dropping passes, and the team hardly resembled the offensive juggernaut that was the reigning Super Bowl champion.
But any team with Patrick Mahomes must be reckoned with, especially come the postseason. He has tormented the Buffalo Bills the past two seasons, and playing on the road in the AFC championship game for the first time, he operated with poise and precision, two things the Ravens sorely lacked.
In addition to his supreme skill, what sets Mahomes apart is his ability to execute flawlessly in the game’s biggest moments. On the Chiefs’ opening drive, he fired a perfect strike to tight end Travis Kelce on fourth-and-2 for 13 yards, and his 19-yard touchdown pass to Kelce was perfectly placed to Kelce’s outside hip with Kyle Hamilton in coverage.
Then on his last pass of the day, Mahomes lofted a perfect strike to Marquez Valdes-Scantling that essentially ended the game.
Still, this isn’t the Chiefs of the past few years, when their leaky defense would give up points and Mahomes and the offense would simply score as many as they needed.
The Chiefs’ defense, guided by defensive coordinator and longtime Harbaugh friend Steve Spagnuolo, has been tenacious and stingy all season. They ranked No. 2 overall, and Spagnuolo got the best of Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken all day.
Mahomes had his moments, but the Chiefs defense tormented and stymied the Ravens in a way few teams have done this season. That’s why the Chiefs are headed to Las Vegas and the Ravens are headed to the offseason two weeks earlier than they had hoped.
“That’s a championship team,” Ravens wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. said, “and they came out and they played better ball.”
2. Lamar Jackson was simply outplayed by Patrick Mahomes.
Jackson likes to say he doesn’t play against the other team’s quarterback, he plays against the defense, and he’s correct. But the bottom line is Mahomes operated more cleanly, more crisply and more efficiently than Jackson did.
Head coach John Harbaugh and teammates rallied around Jackson, saying it’s a team game and a loss never falls on one player. Also correct.
“It’s not a one-man show by any means,” linebacker Roquan Smith said. “It’s a team thing. It’s a team that gets the job done.”
Zay Flowers fumbled a ball into the end zone. Nelson Agholor dropped a potential first down on the Ravens’ opening drive. Offensive linemen were getting pushed around at times.
But Jackson wasn’t particularly sharp, even when he did have time to throw. He missed some open receivers in a way that Mahomes rarely did. He lost a fumble on a strip-sack. He had balls batted at the line of scrimmage, including one that he caught for a 13-yard gain. At times he failed to spot open receivers. Then he forced a pass for Isaiah Likely into triple coverage for the Ravens’ third turnover of the game.
“We turned the ball over,” Jackson said. “We were driving the ball. … [If] we keep the ball in our possession, we’re putting points on the board.”
Jackson is likely to win his second league Most Valuable Player Award in a couple of weeks, and his body of work over the season is undeniable. But on this stage, when the margin for error is smallest because the opponents are increasingly difficult, Mahomes delivered in ways that Jackson didn’t.
With Jackson’s singular dual-threat ability, and his improvisational ability, which was on full display on his 30-yard touchdown pass to Flowers, Jackson has the potential to take charge of any game. But against Mahomes and the Chiefs, Jackson needs to be on target and free of mistakes, two things that were in short supply.
“The greats have all been through tough times,” wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. said, “and I don’t think this is going to stop him from wanting to get the ultimate goal. I think, if anything, he’s going to work even harder.”
3. Todd Monken’s offensive approach left much to be desired.
Baltimore’s offensive coordinator was at his best last weekend when the Ravens adjusted their offense at halftime, scored on three straight drives and pulled away to a 34-10 win against Houston in the divisional round.
This week, though, Monken had no answers against the Chiefs’ defense, and his offensive approach seemed curious at best.
The Chiefs allowed 4.46 yards a carry during the regular season, which ranked 24th in the league, and yet the Ravens all but ignored their running backs. Ravens running backs finished the game with six carries for 23 yards, and carried just two times after halftime. Gus Edwards ran three times for 20 yards, including a 15-yarder, and Justice Hill carried three times for three yards.
To be clear, the Chiefs deserve credit for stifling the Ravens run game other than Jackson, who finished with 54 yards on eight carries. But the Ravens all but abandoned the running game in the second half in a 10-point game, a frequent criticism of former coordinator Greg Roman.
Asked about the Ravens vanishing run game, head coach John Harbaugh said, “It was that kind of a game, I’d say. That’s the way it worked out.”
It was as if Monken made up his mind, with the Ravens trailing by 10, that the Ravens would lean on Jackson and the passing attack. Except that wasn’t working.
The Chiefs’ blitzes harassed and inundated Jackson into sacks, batted passes and rushed incompletions. Monken had no answer for it. In other games, Monken and Jackson at times turned to quick slants to Odell Beckham Jr. or hitches or bubble screens to Zay Flowers to counter pressure. Beckham, the Ravens’ highest paid receiver, didn’t see a pass thrown his way until the fourth quarter.
One questionable sequence came late in the second quarter with the Ravens facing third-and-4 from the Ravens’ 47. Harbaugh has always preached that possession matters against Mahomes and the Chiefs, and it would be understandable if the Ravens tried to use two plays to run for 4 yards and move the chains. That would have essentially allowed them to keep the ball for the rest of the half at worst.
Instead, Jackson floated a pass toward Hill along the right sideline that sailed high and out of bounds. He probably wouldn’t have gained more than a yard if he caught it. Facing fourth-and-4, the Ravens punted, and the Chiefs marched 55 yards in eight plays and kicked a 52-yard field goal for a 17-7 lead at the half.
Where were the running backs? Where were the halftime adjustments against the blitz? Monken was totally outclassed by his defensive counterpart, Chiefs coordinator Steve Spagnuolo.
4. The Ravens played as if the moment were too big for them.
All week long, the Ravens talked about how this AFC championship game was just the next one on the schedule, and how the throng of national media parading through the locker room would have no bearing on their approach.
Yet from start to finish, the Ravens looked like a team overmatched by the moment, and the Chiefs played like the poised team that had been here before — six years in a row, in fact.
The Ravens lost their poise with five personal foul penalties, including a taunting penalty by Zay Flowers that wiped out 15 yards of a 54-yard pass play. Kyle Van Noy was hit with an unnecessary roughness call for a skirmish with Travis Kelce, and two plays later, Travis Jones was flagged for roughing the passer when he raked a hand across Patrick Mahomes’ face.
Those 30 yards in penalties proved to be a big assist on the Chiefs’ field-goal drive at the end of the first half. Van Noy’s penalty might have been soft, and Kelce surely goaded Van Noy into it. But Van Noy is a veteran guy with Super Bowl experience who should know better.
Later, Jadeveon Clowney was hit with a roughing the passer penalty, and Roquan Smith was called for unnecessary roughness when he blasted the Chiefs’ offensive line before the snap. Smith appeared to be trying for an offside call to put the Chiefs in first-and-10 instead of first-and-5 — and it was only first-and-5 because the Ravens inexcusably had too many men on the field on a first-down play after a touchback.
The Ravens also had crucial mistakes with three turnovers, though the Chiefs’ defense made effort plays on two of them. (Jackson’s interception into triple-coverage was a gift.)
In addition to three turnovers, the Ravens committed eight penalties totaling 95 yards, they failed to execute in key spots, and at no point did they look as composed as the Chiefs, for whom this AFC championship game thing has become a yearly occurrence.
“When they needed critical plays, they made critical plays,” linebacker Patrick Queen said. “They executed. We didn’t. You can’t do that in the playoffs. It comes down to every single play. On every single play, you have to capitalize, and we didn’t.”
5. The Ravens’ roster faces upheaval, but their competitive window remains wide-open.
Fighting back tears after the game, Roquan Smith said the loss especially hurts because of how far the team had come and how close it was to its ultimate goal.
“It sucks, just knowing how close we were to what we really wanted,” he said.
It’s probably most painful for longtime veterans such as Kevin Zeitler, Brent Urban and Morgan Moses, who had never won a playoff game until last week and might wonder if a chance like this will come again. The next few months will bring the annual roster churn, with some players leaving for good and new players replacing them.
There are no guarantees that the Ravens can put together a run like this next year, or the year after that. That’s the beauty and agony of sports. But they can take some solace in the fact that the competitive window for this team is far from closing.
MVP quarterback Lamar Jackson, All-Pro tight end Mark Andrews, All-Pro linebacker Roquan Smith and All-Pro safety Kyle Hamilton all are signed for the next few years, and that gives the team the fabric it needs to build another team worthy of competing for division and conference titles.
“[We] put ourselves in this position because we worked for it,” Hamilton said. “So back to square one again. [We’ll] do the same thing, and hopefully, next year, win this game and get to the Super Bowl.”
Will Justin Madubuike be back on a long-term deal or the franchise tag? Patrick Queen? J.K. Dobbins? Those are all questions for another day, after the pain and sting of this wears off. But the Ravens remain one of the most consistently successful organizations in the league.
They have proved that they have an owner who will spend the money to compete, they have a general manager who will build a roster to compete, and they have a coaching staff that will have that roster in position to win more often than not.
And now, they have a roster that is hungry and motivated by this loss.
“It sucks,” Smith said. “It’s definitely going to add fuel in the offseason as well as the season coming up next year.”
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox