“We need to play better than we did the first time we played them,” Bengals coach Zac Taylor said. “Just rewatching that tape, (there were) so many correctable things that we need to do a better job of, so that’s good. There’s a lot of fuel there for us to certainly play better than we did the first time around.”
The Bengals converted just two of 10 third downs on offense, ran for just 25 yards on 11 carries and finished with 222 yards for the game, but the defense also fell flat, giving up 421 yards, including 153 on the ground and a lot of explosive plays.
Both phases of the game have shown improvements since then, and Browning has been taking advantage of his weapons to successfully move the ball. He could be down his top receiver if Ja’Marr Chase isn’t able to play through a shoulder sprain. But on Saturday, the Bengals showed they aren’t reliant on one player. Each of the top three receivers made crucial plays to help them come back from a 14-point deficit in the fourth quarter.
Tee Higgins scored two touchdowns, including a 21-yard reception with 48 seconds left to send the game to overtime. Chase grabbed a 24-yard pass deep down the middle to convert a third-and-21 on a drive where Joe Mixon scored on a 1-yard run to tie the game at 17 with less than eight minutes left. Tyler Boyd converted a third-and-9 with a 44-yard catch that put Cincinnati in position for Evan McPherson’s game-winning field goal.
“You’ve got to have weapons to be successful in this league, and we’ve always known that,” Taylor said. “.. It’s not always going to be perfect, the perfect play. It’s not always going to be there, and so you need guys to take over the game and we had a lot of guys take over the game (Saturday) and step up and make big plays and that’s just National Football League. You watch games all over the place, and it’s usually great players stepping up and making plays in big moments and we had plenty of those guys on the field (Saturday) and plenty of them made the play.”
The third-and-21 play probably was the most surprising. Only two teams previously this season had converted a third down where 21 yards or more were needed in 101 prior instances.
Taylor said the play wasn’t even one the staff had mapped out in its third-and-11-plus category on the call sheet, but quarterbacks coach Dan Pitcher suggested it. The Bengals had one full-speed rep of that play in practice last week and the pass was intercepted but with a different coverage look than the Vikings brought.
“There’s different situations in the course of the game where you need to be aggressive on third and long and some you don’t, and that was one we needed to be aggressive because where we were at in the game fourth quarter,” Taylor said. “You had to have it in that situation. … That was a moment we needed to be aggressive and so we called a dagger route is what that’s called and Jake did a great job with the location of the throw and the timing of the throw, the protection was really good. Ja’Marr ran through there and big play.”
Cincinnati also had some key plays on defense against the Vikings that can spark some confidence going forward, even with D.J. Reader now out for the season with a torn quad tendon.
B.J. Hill picked off a pass for the second game in a row as the Vikings were trying to convert a third-and-7 from the Cincinnati 22-yard line with 31 seconds left in the first half. About four minutes earlier, Mike Hilton intercepted a pass at the Bengals’ 17.
However, the biggest play might have been the fourth-and-1 stop made by Hill and Trey Hendrickson in overtime after the Bengals offense went three-and-out on their first drive. Minnesota just needed a field goal to win it, but after Joseph Ossai tackled Nick Mullens for no gain on third-and-1, Hill and Hendrickson came up with the next big stop on another Mullens sneak to put the offense on its own 42 to start the game-winning drive.
“On the first one, the third-and-1, Germaine (Pratt) just tugging a little bit on the quarterback, doesn’t allow him to get that second effort to get the first down, and then fourth down, really just those two guys inside (Zach Carter and Hill) really got the whole thing started,” Taylor said. “They did an excellent job of coming off the ball and disrupting there.”
SATURDAY’S GAME
Bengals at Steelers, 4:30 p.m., NBC, 700, 1530, 102.7, 104.7
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