This game didn’t start off the way the Kansas City Chiefs had hoped. They found themselves playing from behind for the majority of the game with turnovers and penalties piling up throughout. Somehow, this game managed to get to overtime. The defense needed to make a play to get the offense the ball back and Frank “The Shark” Clark made the play needed. Jerick McKinnon called the game with a great touchdown scamper on the ensuing offensive play.
So what else did we learn about the Chiefs in their latest game?
Final Score: Chiefs 30, Texans 24
The Chiefs are the third-least penalized team in the league this season, but you wouldn’t be able to tell by the results of this game. Kansas City finished the game with 10 penalties for 103 yards on the day. It was the most penalties in a single game since Week 9 against the Titans for the Chiefs (10). The 103 penalty yards were the most for K.C. in a single game this season. To contextualize the situation – the Texans had 125 passing yards in regulation.
Weekly Awards
- Chiefs Wire Game Ball: QB Patrick Mahomes
- Harrison Butker Rookie of the Game: LB Leo Chenal
- Casey Wiegmann Veteran of the Game: DE Carlos Dunlap
- Jamaal Charles Offensive Player of the Game: RB Jerick McKinnon
- Bobby Bell Defensive Player of the Game: DE Frank Clark
- Morten Andersen Special Teams Player of the Game: P Tommy Townsend
- Otis Taylor Play of the Game: Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes’ 5-yard rushing touchdown.
- Wesley Roesch Stat of the Game: Texans average gain – 3.9 yards per play.
Quick-hitting observations and analysis
- The first half of this game wasn’t particularly great for the Chiefs on both offense and defense. The team played with a big lack of urgency all around, which isn’t terribly surprising given the quality of their opponent.
- Chiefs WR JuJu Smith-Schuster has been getting beat up in the passing game today. He’s doing some dirty work in the middle of the field and has been taking hits because of it.
- Speaking of Smith-Schuster, he’s one of six Chiefs players to catch every target in Week 15. Jerick McKinnon, Travis Kelce, Noah Gray, Kadarius Toney and Isiah Pacheco were the other two.
- Kelce continues to do amazing things, moving up the all-time receiving yards leaderboard at the TE position. He passed Shannon Sharpe to secure fourth place in NFL history.
- Turnovers continue to be a thorn in the side of this offense. They added two turnovers today, marking their ninth consecutive game with a turnover. They need to clean these up before the playoffs or it will cost them.
- A week ago, the Chiefs allowed a season-high of 28 points to the Broncos’ offense. This week, they allowed the Texans to match their season-high of 24 points. The defense has some soul-searching to do after the past two weeks.
- Red zone offense, even with Kadarius Toney back in the lineup, hasn’t been great. The team tried to get Skyy Moore involved in the jet sweep game, but he’s just not as effective as players like Mecole Hardman and Toney.
- Carl Cheffers officiates Chiefs games in a predictable way. Everyone saw this coming from a mile away. Perhaps the NFL should look into that and do something about it (they won’t).
- Trusting Harrison Butker over Patrick Mahomes with the game on the line was a surprising decision that seems to be made far too often by Andy Reid. I get showing faith in your players, but Butker had matched his career high of field goal misses to this point in the season. Trust your MVP, half-billion-dollar-earning quarterback to go out and win it.
- Speaking of the MVP, Mahomes should be squarely back atop the race after his performance in Week 15. He made some great plays on the ground and through the air in this game that directly led to a Chiefs win.
- Frank Clark continues to have a penchant for showing up clutch in big moments for this team. His forced fumble and the recovery by Willie Gay Jr. came just in time, with the game on the line. It set up the offense for the game-winning score in overtime.
Up next:
The Chiefs are back home at Arrowhead Stadium for the first time in three weeks. They’ll face Geno Smith and the Seattle Seahawks on Christmas Eve in their first Saturday game of the season. The early forecast shows that they could be getting their first taste of “football weather” too.
