Good afternoon, everyone. On Sunday afternoon, the Green Bay Packers took on the New England Patriots at Lambeau Field. Before the game, I thought that the Packers would take care of the Patriots by at least two touchdowns. It turns out that the game was very stressful as it went to overtime. The Packers were able to win it barely. Let’s take a look at how the game went down, shall we?
The Packers started this game on the defensive side of the ball. Their first time on the field did not begin well. During the drive, the defense allowed the Patriots to get a few first downs, including a 27-yard pass from Brian Hoyer to a wide open Nelson Agholor that got New England into field goal range. Luckily, a field goal by Nick Folk was all that they got to end the drive as the Patriots took a 3-0 lead with 9:45 left in the first quarter. After the kickoff resulted in a touchback, the Packers started their first offensive possession. It started great with a 24-yard pass completion from Aaron Rodgers to Allen Lazard. However, the Packers turned the ball over after Romeo Doubs caught an iffy pass and didn’t hang on to the ball, which was recovered by New England’s Jack Jones at the Green Bay 49. Thankfully, the defense was able to keep the Patriots from scoring anything after that fumble recovery. On third and 10 from the Green Bay 37, Brian Hoyer was sacked by Rashan Gary for a loss of 8 yards, forcing the Patriots to punt back to Green Bay. After the punt resulted in a touchback, the Packers offense took over at their own 20. On second and 5, Aaron Jones ran for a 20-yard gain to give the Packers a first down. A face mask penalty against New England added 15 yards to the end of the run, meaning that the Packers were in Patriots territory after just 2 plays. 3 plays later, however, the drive ended in a punt after Aaron Rodgers was sacked on third and 9 from the NE 39. The punt by Pat O’Donnell was fair caught at the 8 yard line. From here until the end of the game, Bailey Zappe started at QB after Hoyer left with a head injury. A false start penalty was followed by a couple of more plays that went nowhere. New England ended up going three and out and punting back to the Packers. Amari Rodgers only returned the punt 4 yards, but there was a horse collar penalty that gave the Packers the ball at midfield. From there, the offense was able to score a touchdown in only 6 plays. A mix of runs by Aaron Jones and AJ Dillon was followed by Christian Watson’s first ever touchdown from 15 yards out (plus a Lambeau Leap). The extra point by Mason Crosby was good, giving the Packers a 7-3 lead with 13 minutes left in the second quarter. The defense was then able to force the Patriots to punt after a 6 play drive that didn’t get past their own 40 yard line. The punt resulted in a touchback, letting the Packers start at their 20 yard line. From there, the Packers didn’t do anything of note and went three and out after a deep pass to Allen Lazard went incomplete. The punt by Pat O’Donnell went out of bounds at the New England 40 yard line. However, there was an illegal block penalty that forced the Patriots to start at the 25 instead. After 2 runs of 5 and 15 yards gave the Patriots a first down at the 45, the Packers defense made them punt after a third down pass play ended short of the first down marker. The ensuing punt was fair caught at the GB 9 yard line by Amari Rodgers. The Packers’ offensive drive stalled out after two straight deep balls by Aaron Rodgers fell incomplete. The punt by Pat O’Donnell was returned to the 50 yard line by Marcus Jones, giving the Patriots a short field to work with. Thankfully, Rashan Gary ended any hopes of a scoring drive when he strip-sacked Zappe and forced a fumble, which he also recovered. With 54 seconds left, I thought that Aaron Rodgers and the offense would quickly get into at least field goal range. Instead, Rodgers threw his fourth ever pick six (awful throw by Rodgers). The recipient of the pick six was Jack Jones, who also recovered the fumble in the first quarter. The pick six plus the extra point gave the Patriots a 10-7 lead heading into the halftime break.
The Packers offense responded to that bad end of half sequence with a 10-play, 81-yard drive that culminated in a touchdown. On third and 10 from the 19 yard line, Aaron Rodgers connected with Allen Lazard for a 32-yard pass completion that got Green Bay into New England territory. Aaron Jones ran for two first downs on this drive, including a run that went for 17 yards on a fourth and 1 from the NE 28. A holding penalty on David Bakhtiari did not stop the Packers from scoring a touchdown on this possession. Rodgers connected with TE Robert Tonyan on a 19-yard scoring strike that (with the extra point) gave the Packers a 14-10 lead with 9:20 left in the third quarter. The defense were not able to keep the Patriots from scoring a touchdown on their next drive. It didn’t help matters that 1: Kenny Clark was called for unnecessary roughness and gave the Patriots a free first down, and 2: there should’ve been a delay of game called before the touchdown pass from Bailey Zappe to Devante Parker even happened. The Patriots got extremely lucky there and took a 17-14 lead with 4:52 left in the third quarter. After the kick return by Amari Rodgers, the Packers offense took over at their own 21 yard line. Things started great with Romeo Doubs catching a short pass and taking it 16 yards to the GB 37. A 9 yard run by AJ Dillon and an 8 yard run by Aaron Jones got the Packers another first down. On the next play, Rodgers connected with Lazard for a 19-yard pass completion that got them into scoring range. They were not able to get another first down after that and were forced to settle for a 38 yard field goal by Mason Crosby, which was good to tie the score at 17-17 with 5 seconds left in the third quarter. Once again, though, the defense was not able to stop the Patriots from scoring a touchdown on their next drive. It was mainly focused on the running back duo of Rhamondre Stevenson and Damien Harris. The latter back scored the touchdown from 5 yards out, giving New England a 24-17 lead with 11:14 left in the fourth quarter. The Packers’ next possession started out with a viral moment. After the second and 10 play resulted in a 4-yard run by Jones, Rodgers tried to catch the defense with too many men. He couldn’t get it done, prompting him to yell at the center (Josh Myers): “Snap the (bleep)ing ball!”. What I liked was that afterwards, Tony Romo, who called the game for CBS with Jim Nantz, paraphrased it in a more calm manner. Thankfully, the Packers got things going with a 24-yard pass completion to Randall Cobb for a key first down. AJ Dillon was responsible for the Packers’ two other first downs on the drive. The drive ended with a 13-yard touchdown pass to Romeo Doubs, who celebrated by leaping into the stands himself. That touchdown pass was also Aaron Rodgers’ 500th of his career, counting both regular season and postseason TD passes. The extra point was good, tying the game at 24-24 with 6:14 left in regulation. The defense responded with a three and out. On second and 6 from the NE 29, Bailey Zappe was sacked for a loss of nine yards by Jarran Reed. The short pass to Hunter Henry on third down was short of the sticks, forcing New England to punt it away. The ball bounced out of bounds at the Green Bay 43 yard line with 3:50 left in regulation. On third and 6 from the 49 yard line, Aaron Rodgers threw incomplete to Randall Cobb. However, there was a pass interference penalty that gave the Packers a free first down. 3 plays later, Romeo Doubs nearly caught a touchdown pass that would have given the Packers the lead with a little over two minutes left. The refs decided that Doubs did not complete the process of the catch due to the ball hitting the ground. Matt LaFleur then challenged it and basically wasted a timeout due to the play standing as called. Pat O’Donnell then punted the ball to the two yard line, where Keisean Nixon downed the ball with 1:52 left. The Packers defense then forced a three and out, but the Patriots just let the time run out because of the Packers having no timeouts left. After a short punt return that was backed up due to an illegal block penalty, the Packers had one last chance to score with 4 seconds left. Instead of Rodgers Hail Mary-ing it, they went for a short pass that only went 9 yards with a lateral thrown in there.
Thankfully, the Packers received the coin toss to receive the ball first in overtime. They did nothing with the chance, as they went three and out and punted. The defense responded with a three and out of their own, setting up the offense with the ball at their own 23 yard line. From there, the Packers were able to use the remaining 6 minutes and 47 seconds to get the win. They got a few key first downs via passing and running plays as they got all the way to the New England 13 yard line to set up a chip shot field goal for Mason Crosby, who wasn’t messed up by a Bill Belichick “ice the kicker” timeout. The kick was good from 31 yards out, giving the Packers a 27-24 win as time expired in OT. With the win, the Packers improve their record to 3-1 on the season.
(Here are the highlights of the game, provided by the NFL's YouTube page. Click on the "Watch on YouTube"link.)
Offensively, the Packers were a mixed bag. In the first half, they were only able to score a single touchdown against a Patriots defense that I do have to give credit for playing hard on Sunday. There were two turnovers in that half: the catch and fumble by Romeo Doubs and an awful throw by Aaron Rodgers that went for a pick six. Rodgers was off for most of the first half, but he was able to get things done in the second half and overtime. Aaron Jones and AJ Dillon helped the cause by running for 183 yards combined. Christian Watson also ran for 15 yards and his first ever touchdown (and Lambeau Leap). In terms of receiving, Allen Lazard led the way with 6 catches for 116 yards. Romeo Doubs caught 5 passes for 47 yards and a touchdown (his second straight game with a touchdown catch). Doubs almost caught a second TD that would have given Green Bay the lead in regulation. I’m sure that Doubs will get a long TD catch soon enough. Randall Cobb caught only 3 passes, but all of the catches were for key first downs, including one in overtime. The offensive line did a solid job protecting Rodgers, although he once again got sacked for holding the ball too long. I know that this offense won’t be perfect every week, but I was glad to see that the early turnovers did not fully affect the offense in the second half. I really liked how the offense got things done when they mattered most in overtime to set up Mason Crosby’s field goal. Hopefully the offense makes less mistakes in London next week.
On defense, the Packers played well against the Patriots at times. Yes, there were a couple of instances where Nelson Agholor was wide open for a catch that got the Patriots within scoring range. In addition to that, they should’ve played better on that touchdown pass that was somehow allowed due to the refs missing a delay of game penalty. Obviously, the Packers defense allowed over 150 rushing yards combined. On the other side, there were moments where the defense got the three and outs and the critical plays when they were needed. The defense got a total of 4 sacks on the day (2 for Rashan Gary, 1 for Jarran Reed, and half a sack for Preston Smith and Dean Lowry). One of Gary’s sacks resulted in a fumble that Gary himself recovered. I have to give credit to the Patriots for playing hard on offense as well, despite them being down to their third string quarterback. I was expecting a couple of picks, but the defense wasn’t able to get any more takeaways other than the strip sack. I’m thankful that the defense got the stops when they were needed, especially in overtime when they forced a three and out. I do hope that they play better against the run next week in London.
On Special Teams, the Packers played well again, other than a couple of odd penalties and a couple of decent New England kick and punt returns. Pat O’Donnell punted two balls inside the 10 yard line, with one of those punts being downed at the two by Keisean Nixon. Mason Crosby was once again reliable, making every field goal and extra point kick, including the game winner in overtime. Amari Rodgers did not do that great with the punt returns, although part of it was due to the coverage unit of New England. He did get some help with a horse collar tackle penalty on one of his returns. At the very least, the Packers didn’t have any blocked kicks, turnovers, or muffed punts. I really like it when Special Teams help the Packers. I hope this trend continues on for the whole year.
Overall, it was a stressful victory for which I’m glad the Packers pulled off. Anything can happen in the NFL, and the Patriots played hard at Lambeau. But thank goodness the Packers won that game in the end. Next up for the Packers is a trip to London to take on the (surprisingly 3-1) New York Giants. I’ll talk more about that game later. In the meantime, I’ll be celebrating a Victory Monday. Go Pack Go!
Commentaires