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New week, same swan song for the Las Vegas Raiders as the team coughed away another big lead resulting in a sixth loss for the team through the first eight weeks of the season.
Las Vegas was shocked by the Jacksonville Jaguars, 27-20, Sunday, Nov. 6 from TIAA Bank Field in Florida. For the third time this season, the Raiders blew a 17 or more point lead falling to 0-5 in one-score games this year.
“It’s not good enough and I know that,” head coach Josh McDaniels said. “We’ve got to coach better in those situations. We’ve got to avoid feeling like the situation is okay. I don’t sense that our team relaxes when we have that situation but obviously that may be the wrong thing.”
Coming into the game, the Jaguars had lost five straight games.
With the loss, Las Vegas falls to 0-5 on the road this season while dropping to 2-6 overall on the year. The team is in last place in the AFC West.
Head coach Josh McDaniels is now 13-23 as a head coach in the NFL.
“It certainly doesn’t feel like that,” he said when asked if the team was closer to completing a full game. “I think you earn the right to do that. We have to do it, it doesn’t matter what I stand up here and talk about or what somebody else talks about. It’s about actions.” The Raiders will now return to Allegiant Stadium for the first time since Oct. 23 where they have a 2-1 record.
The Indianapolis Colts will travel into town for a Sunday, Nov. 13 matchup against Las Vegas. Kickoff is scheduled for 1:05 p.m.
“We’ve got to learn how to play a full four-quarter game,” McDaniels said. “We’ve played stretches in each game mostly where we’ve played good football but that’s not enough to win in this league.”
On the final play of their last drive, the Raiders had its lateral pass attempt disrupted. The fact that Las Vegas needed a lateral on its final drive may be baffling considering the red-hot start for this offense. After being held to just one reception last week, receiver Davante Adams was relied on early and often throughout the first half in this one.
Adams reeled in back-to-back receptions on the team’s first drive of the game including an 11-yard grab on 3rd and 9. He even bailed Las Vegas out of a 1st and 20 situation with a 21-yard catch.
Eventually, Adams danced his way to six receptions for 88 yards and a touchdown on the game’s opening drive.
“They gave us an element of some single coverage in the first half,” McDaniels said. “He had some production against what I would say is single coverage. In the second half, there was a little bit more split safety defense in general.”
Less than five minutes into the second quarter, Adams hauled in his second touchdown of the day. He has now scored multiple touchdowns in two of the last four games for a total of seven through the first eight games of the season.
By halftime, Adams had tallied a season-high 146 yards on nine catches, one-shy of tying his season-high. Not to mention, the Raiders had a 20-10 lead after already leading 17-0.
On the other hand, Carr went 16-for-21, throwing for 223 yards in the first half with two touchdowns. Early in the second quarter, he passed former New York Giants quarterback Phil Simms for 39th on the NFL’s all-time passing yards list.
The script completely flipped in the second half.
Though he left the game unscathed, Carr flirted with two second half interceptions. While leading the offense, Las Vegas opened the second half with three straight punts before turning the ball over on downs and fumbling the lateral.
“We had chances,” McDaniels said. “Let’s not sit here and say we didn’t have chances. We certainly had chances in the second half to complete balls to [Adams] and anybody else.”
The connection to Adams just wasn’t there in the second half. On a 3rd and 10, Adams appeared to have the first down but was unable to keep his feet in bounds along the sideline.
By that point, the Raiders were already facing their first deficit of the game at 24-20 after the second rushing touchdown from Jaguars running back Travis Etienne Jr.
Now with the lead, Jacksonville was able to turn up the pressure in the secondary making it harder for Carr and Adams to re-establish their rhythm.
With less than three minutes left in regulation, Carr turned to Adams on second and third down, both of which fell incomplete.
Adams recorded just one second half reception for no gain.
With one final chance to keep the drive alive, Carr re-directed his attention to receiver Hunter Renfrow on 4th and 2 but like second and third down fell incomplete.
“You could run it there for sure,” McDaniels said when asked about the decision to throw the ball three straight times with two yards to go. “There’s definitely an opportunity to do that if you thought that was the right thing to do. We’ll look at it and see what we did.”
Carr ended the night, 21-for-36 with 259 passing yards and two touchdowns.