Lamar winless no more, leads Ravens to 20-13 win over Titans
Lamar Jackson finally has his first post-season victory, and coming away from Baltimore makes it even more impressive.
Jackson ran for 136 yards and a 48-yard touchdown while throwing for 179 more as the Ravens rallied from 10 points down and beat the Tennessee Titans 20-13 on Monday (AEDT) in their AFC wildcard game.
Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson celebrates victory over the Titans.Credit:Getty Images
Baltimore also shut down 2000-yard rusher Derrick Henry and held Tennessee to their fewest points all season.
The Titans (11-6) had the ball and a chance to tie when Marcus Peters intercepted Ryan Tannehill's pass intended for Kalif Raymond with 1:50 left. After the turnover, the Ravens came onto the field and started waving goodbye to the Titans – drawing a taunting penalty they didn't mind at all.
"We finished finally," Jackson said. "We finally finished."
The Ravens (12-5) snapped a string of 21 straight games lost by the franchise in either the regular season or playoffs when trailing by 10 or more. They will play either top-seeded Kansas City or Buffalo in a divisional game set up by how Baltimore stopped Henry for the first time in three games.
The All-Pro ran all over the Ravens with 328 yards rushing combined in the past two meetings. With both Calais Campbell and Brandon Williams back on the Baltimore D-line, Henry had his worst performance this season with 18 carries for 40 yards.
Baltimore smothered a Tennessee offence that tied for fourth averaging 30.7 points a game and had more offensive yards per game during the season than any team but Kansas City. The Ravens finished with a 401-209 yards edge in total offence.
The Titans lost their first home playoff game in 12 years and now have had three of their past eight post-seasons ended on their own field by Baltimore.
Tennessee sacked Jackson five times and got an interception. But the Titans settled for a pair of field goals and couldn't slow Jackson enough after half-time. Jackson turned in the sixth 100-yard rushing game by a quarterback in the post-season, and joined Colin Kaepernick with two.
The Titans took a 10-0 lead by out-gaining Baltimore 126-36 in the first quarter, with Tannehill tossing a 10-yard TD pass to Pro Bowl wide receiver A.J. Brown. Stephen Gostkowski kicked a field goal set up by Malcolm Butler's interception, his first in the post-season since picking off Russell Wilson in Super Bowl 49 to preserve New England’s win over the Seahawks.
The Ravens kept Derrick Henry under wraps.Credit:AP
Baltimore's defence, the second-stingiest scoring unit in the NFL, took over. The Ravens held Tennessee to minus-seven yards in the second quarter, the third fewest in any quarter of a playoff game since the 2000 season.
The 2019 NFL MVP helped Baltimore pile up 134 yards as he set up a 33-yard field goal by Justin Tucker with a 28-yard pass to Marquise Brown. Jackson then tied it by breaking loose for a 48-yard touchdown run, diving for the pylon – the second-longest touchdown run by a quarterback in the Super Bowl era behind Kaepernick's 56-yarder for the 49ers against the Packers on January 12, 2013.
Rookie J.K. Dobbins made it 17-10 with a 4-yard touchdown run to open the third quarter. That gave him a rushing touchdown in seven straight games, second only to Maurice Jones-Drew's eight in 2006 since the 1970 merger.
The Titans finally stopped the Ravens' scoring spree at 17 when Gostkowski kicked a 25-yard field goal to start the fourth quarter, pulling within 17-13.
AP