For the fourth time in five games this season, the Las Vegas Raiders lost another one-possession football game. This time, it came against the division-rival Kansas City Chiefs by one point.
The Raiders lost 30-29 and had multiple opportunities to take the lead after jumping out to an early 17-0 lead.
After Las Vegas (1-4) forced Kansas City (4-1) to punt before the two-minute warning with one timeout, quarterback Derek Carr was ready to go after one of his signature game-winning fourth quarter drives, this time in a primetime setting against one of his AFC West foes.
Las Vegas got two first downs from running back Josh Jacobs on the ground. Then, Carr and the Raiders faced third-and-1 with 51 seconds left.
Carr found Adams for a 16-yard catch. But after review, Adams did not have two feet in bounds by the time he had full possession of the ball. The Raiders faced fourth down, needing just one yard at their own 46-yard line with 47 seconds left in the game.
Facing an all-out blitz, Adams and wide receiver Hunter Renfrow, who were right next to each other before the snap, ran their respective route. The two ultimately ran into each other as the ball fell to ground with no flags.
“I thought we were doing the right thing. I thought we had a shot at the play to Davante on the sidelines. I thought that might have put us into field goal range, or close to field goal range.
And then, they came after us on the fourth-and-1. Unfortunately, we had a couple of guys in the same area and hit each other. We just didn’t make one or two plays to finish it.”
Las Vegas Raiders head coach Josh McDaniels said after the game
Here are 5 takeaways from the Las Vegas Raiders fourth loss of the season in heartbreaking fashion.
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Run game continues to excel behind Josh Jacobs
After recording a career-high 144 yards last week against Denver, this week was going to be a test to see if Jacobs was going to continue to run the ball or if the team was going to revert back to their passing scheme earlier in the season.
Early on, Jacobs stepped up and recorded a rush for as much as 21 yards — leading to 14 carries for 79 yards and a touchdown to set the stage for the Raiders’ 20-10 lead at halftime.
“We figured if we gave ourselves enough chances to run it against them, that we might have some success. Josh is the kind of back that gets better as the game goes on. We’ve got to start turning some of his performances into Ws,” McDaniels said.
Jacobs would end the game with 21 carries for a new career-high 151 yards and a touchdown. In addition, the 24-year-old caught all five of his targets for a team-high five receptions.
As the game progressed, the Raiders continued to rely on Jacobs as it also showed the effectiveness of the offensive line, wide receivers, tight ends and fullback Jakob Johnson to block and open up holes for Jacobs to get down the field.
“He’s a really good back,” McDaniels said. “Give him a lot of credit. Give our offensive line, our tight ends, Jakob a lot of credit. They’re in there banging away and trying to create openings for him and he sees it.”
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Davante Adams makes grand entrance, minus final play
One of the new faces to this rivalry was at the wide receiver position. Tyreek Hill exits on one side and Davante Adams enters on the other side.
Carr’s first find to his former Fresno State teammate came on a fourth-and 1 near midfield. Despite the ball being underthrown, Adams got loose for a 58-yard TD to open the scoring with 8:27 remaining in the first quarter.
It was Carr’s 200th career touchdown pass, helping him become the 19th quarterback in NFL history to reach this amount in 132 games or less. The 200 passing touchdowns also tied for eighth most since Carr entered the league in 2014.
Despite not coming out on the winning end, Carr is appreciative to reach that milestone in a nostalgic way.
“I’ve been doing it long enough, eventually we were going to get there. Happy about it, always thankful. You’re not going to see me disregard that stuff, but I would much rather just win. It’s a lot of hard work that goes into it and to throw it to Tae is pretty special.”
Las Vegas Raiders’ Derek Carr on meeting milestone
Carr and Adams would connect one more time on a long touchdown pass. This time, for 48 yards to cut the deficit down to one with 4:27 left in the game.
In total, Adams recorded three receptions for a game-high 124 yards and two touchdowns on seven targets.
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Las Vegas Raiders miscues loom large in second half
In addition to the Adams-Renfrow collision, there were other plays in the final two quarters that did not go the Raiders’ way.
Following the 48-yard touchdown from Carr to Adams, Las Vegas had a decision to make to either go for two or kick the extra point.
The Las Vegas Raiders decided to be aggressive, which they wanted to be as it helped them jump up to the 17-0 lead, and chose the former.
Jacobs took the two-point conversion snap and came up just short of the goal line keep the score at 30-29.
“Yeah, I liked it,” Carr said of the two-point opportunity. “I like being aggressive, especially on the road. We have the lead early. They come back to take the lead. Boom, we score on a big play to Tae. That feeling of that chess match, going back forth, and you’re like, ‘Let’s go!’”
Another miscue came on special teams in a field goal opportunity for the Las Vegas Raiders as they got their first third down stop with 9:34 left in the third quarter since the 12:32 mark in the second quarter. It ended a streak of six successful third attempts for the Chiefs.
However, a holding penalty on Las Vegas Raiders Malcolm Koonce on a missed field goal attempt continued the drive for the Chiefs, leading to tight end Travis Kelce’s fourth touchdown of the night.
That missed field goal could have given the Raiders the opportunity to regain some momentum against a team that had a dozen different players catch at least one ball and trailing by one point.
Koonce’s penalty was one of a season-high 11 flags for 99 yards committed by Vegas.
Las Vegas Raiders defense has see-saw performance
The Raiders’ defense was going to be challenged from the first play to the final horn, especially going up against Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who completed 29-of-43 passes for 292 yards and four touchdowns.
At the line, one of the questions entering this week was the Raiders EDGE rushers as Chandler Jones was still looking for his first sack in a Las Vegas uniform and Maxx Crosby was questionable to play due to the birth of his first child.
The latter was present as Jones and Crosby each recorded four tackles. Crosby recorded two sacks and three tackles for loss while Jones on the other side had one quarterback hit and multiple quarterback pressures that led to Mahomes throwing the ball away and a loss of downs.
Behind Crosby and Jones, the Las Vegas Raiders secondary waned as the game progressed while penalties and missed tackles hurt them. The secondary had opportunities limit plays that went 10 to 15 yards that were extended to 20-plus yards.
One of the big moments late for the Raiders was linebacker Divine Deablo being able to record one of his team-high 10 tackles behind the line of scrimmage that led to the Chiefs punt, setting up the potential game-winning drive for the offense.
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Red zone scoring was successful for Raiders, more so for the Chiefs
The Raiders mentality in order to score touchdowns on drives going inside the 20-yard line is due to their execution.
Las Vegas took advantage of its only red-zone opportunity, but the Chiefs had more and were successful.
In the second quarter of their third drive, the Raiders were finding success as Adams dropped a pass in the end zone but was benefitted by a pass interference penalty to setup first-and-goal at the 1-yard line.
Two plays later, Jacobs ran the ball – with a good push from the offensive line – to give Las Vegas a 14-0 lead on a drive that lasted 10 plays for 69 yards and took a little more than five minutes off the clock.
In total, Kansas City had four opportunities in the red zone and cashed in all four times to Kelce.
Now, the Las Vegas Raiders head into their bye week next week before restarting on Oct. 23 against the Houston Texans.