NFL
Jaguars come from behind and win in NFL playoffs
Jacksonville quarterback Trevor Lawrence led the Panthers to victory in the second half. photo
© Chris Carlson/AP/dpa
0:27 just before the break, 31:30 at the end of the game: The Jacksonville Jaguars threw out the Los Angeles Chargers with one of the biggest comebacks in NFL playoff history.
The Jacksonville Jaguars defeated the Los Angeles Chargers in one of the greatest playoff comebacks in NFL history.
After trailing 27-0 late in the first half, the underdog turned American football’s duel with the Chargers and ended up winning 31-30. According to US media, there have only been two games in the history of the NFL playoffs with a larger gap that has still been made up. The decision brought a field goal with the clock running out.
“You couldn’t write a crazier script. In the dressing room, we already said it’s a bit like our season is going, we’re never quite out of the fight,” said Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence, who made four bad passes in the first half to the opponent and then made it possible to catch up with four touchdown passes. “I had bad passes in the first half, we didn’t look good offensively, but we just kept believing in each other,” he told NBC. “One playoff game, 27 points down, we’re always counted in those games but we don’t care. We love it.”
The Jaguars had such a poor record in each of the two previous seasons, with just four wins in total, that they had the first pick in the draft, which should go to the weakest team of the previous season. In 2021, the Jaguars brought quarterback Lawrence to Florida. “I didn’t have much of a choice. If you want to get out of this hole, you have to score a lot of points,” Lawrence said of his four bad passes. “I didn’t want to be the reason these guys lose here today.”
Who the Jaguars meet in the second playoff round will be decided in the further duels of the wild card round.