Cincinnati was pretty lucky to get to the Super Bowl.
The wild card game was a FG contest, McPherson won.
In the divisional round Tannehill literally gave them the game. His first pass, a pick, leads to a FG. First possession, second half, Tennessee gets inside the Cincinnati-10 with 4 straight runs, Tannehill's first pass, red zone pick. 28-seconds left in the game, Tannehill pick, Cincinnati has a short field to set up the game-winning FG.
AFCCG I suppose we're giving some credit to the Cincinnati defense but Mahomes literally played to lose the game in the second half. A rare occasion when an elite level quarterback's game inexplicably goes into the dumper so dramatically.
The Super Bowl was there for Cincinnati to take and they actually did nothing with their second half possessions. This of course is excluding the 1-play TD drive with Higgins literally throwing Ramsey to the ground by the facemask. And I suppose the 3 points handed too them by Stafford on the subsequent drive. After that, here are Cincinnati's last 5 possessions:
3 plays, -3 yards, punt
3 plays, 5 yards, punt
5 plays, -2 yards, punt
7 plays, 24 yards, punt
5 plays, 26 yards, downs
In total: 5 possessions, 50 yards, 4 punts, 0 points
That doesn't exactly scream grit and determination. Even as inept as they were on offense, they somehow managed to have the ball at midfield with 3 plays to pick up 1 yard. And with nearly a minute left and two timeouts. They proceeded with three incompetently called and poorly executed plays. It was an ugly finish to very poor second half effort.
