The Kansas City Chiefs win yet another one-possession game while Bryce Young's resurgence with the Carolina Panthers continued - Sky Sports NFL's Neil Reynolds has his final say on Week 14 of the season...
Week 14 in the NFL was a significant one as teams at the top of the standings in the AFC and NFC won, while one huge Super Bowl contender lost.
And we will start there with the Buffalo Bills and their loss to the Los Angeles Rams...
The Rams pulled off a big shock on Sunday night, reminding us all that any team can beat another on an NFL Sunday. The Bills had won seven straight and were among the form teams in the NFL, but the Rams were brilliant from start to finish, led by Matthew Stafford, Puka Nacua and Cooper Kupp.
When those three are healthy and powering the Rams' passing game, they always have a chance to win. They are very much alive in the NFC West race with a 7-6 record, but let's spare a thought for Josh Allen in this game.
He threw for 342 yards and three touchdowns, he rushed for 82 yards and three touchdowns - that is a total of 424 offensive yards and six touchdowns, and he still lost. I think he actually helped his MVP case in a losing cause.
I think the Sam Darnold story is standing the test of time as the outstanding quarterback of the Minnesota Vikings. He led his team to a 42-21 victory over the Atlanta Falcons, a game in which he went toe-to-toe with Kirk Cousins as his returned to Minneapolis having spent six seasons as a starting quarterback for the Vikings.
Darnold was sensational, as he so often has been this season. He threw for 347 yards, five touchdowns and no interceptions and posted a QB rating north of 100 for the 11th time this season, the most of any quarterback.
I know the Vikings have a firm commitment to JJ McCarthy moving forward, but Sam Darnold has been brilliant and gives them every chance of winning games when they get to the playoffs.
I'm worried about Falcons quarterback Kirk Cousins now. He threw up two more interceptions in that loss to the Vikings, and in four straight defeats has thrown no touchdown passes to eight interceptions.
I think he looks immobile, looks like he is struggling to drive the football downfield and he's not exactly being helped out by some of his weapons.
They have their moments but I don't think it is the quality of what we saw on the other side when Darnold was throwing strikes to Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison.
Kirk might be looking over his shoulder, because first-round pick Michael Penix Jr is waiting in the wings. Raheem Morris may feel he has to act quickly, because a season that was looking so good at 6-3 is beginning to fall apart.
This is a familiar sentence to write when I say the Carolina Panthers lost again on Sunday. But this is a different Panthers team now. They lost 22-16 to the Philadelphia Eagles and if you look at the last five weeks with the Panthers they beat the New Orleans Saints and the New York Giants, lost on game-ending field goals to the Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers and now lost by six to an Eagles team that have won nine in a row.
Carolina almost stole the game when Xavier Legette just failed to hold onto a Bryce Young touchdown pass with 44 seconds remaining.
Young has developed big time over the course of the season, especially since returning from the bench. If he has a strong finish, they may not be needing to look for a quarterback in the future because things are looking up now.
The Kansas City Chiefs did it again. They found a way to win a game that was slipping away from them. It hadn't been brilliant on offense for the Chiefs, but when the Chargers took a 17-16 lead with four-and-a-half minutes left, that was twice as much time as Patrick Mahomes needed.
He marched them downfield and Matthew Wright doinks the winning 31-yard field goal in off the post, clinching the AFC West for a ninth year in a row for Kansas City.
There are concerns here. This offense gets bogged down far too often in the red zone, which is where Mahomes and Travis Kelce used to absolutely thrive.
And their quarterback took another beating behind a worrying offensive line, which will be an issue going down the stretch. They have to find a way to conjure up protection because he is getting battered every week.
It's very very hard to ignore what Josh Allen did, but I think Sam Darnold was excellent against the Falcons.
It would have meant a lot to him going up against Kirk Cousins, there was a lot of emotion and attention on Cousins so it was a big moment and he only had six incompletions alongside five touchdown passes. He was dunking downfield and it showed how prolific he and this Vikings offense can be.
I'm going with Detroit's fourth-and-one with 43 seconds left in a tied game against the Green Bay Packers. Tied at 31-31, the Lions could have kicked a field goal there at the 21-yard line but it would have left about 35 seconds for Jordan Love to win the game.
So Dan Campbell decided to end it there with a run by David Montgomery, who if unable to pick up the first time gives Love a chance to go and win the game.
But also if they kick the field goal there, Jordan Love has the chance to go and win the game, so I understand the decision.
It's brave, it's what Dan Campbell does. Jared Goff did a great job, he got stood on by an offensive lineman and fell to the ground, but just managed to reach out and hand that ball to Montgomery who followed some great blocking to get the first down and set up the field goal for an 11th straight win.
I'm going to go with Dan Campbell, not only because of the fourth-and-one call, but because he was aggressive all night. He attempted five fourth down plays, four were successful and one failed and led to a short field and a Packers touchdown.
But I think his players love him for the faith he shows in them and I was in that stadium in Detroit on Thursday, while it was noisy and the atmosphere was great there was also a nervousness among fans as if they don't want to believe how good this team can be.
The coaching staff and players never blinked, they don't back down at all and believe they can win every game. It all comes from Dan Campbell and the belief he has shown.
It was heart-breaking to see Carolina running back Jonathan Brooks go down on Sunday against the Eagles. I feared for him as I saw it live, and it turns out he has re-torn the ACL that he injured in college 13 months ago when he was at Texas.
This is a talented young player who was so close to getting to the NFL and then had to wait to make his debut.
He was only back a couple of games before he gets hurt again, and you just think about what he will have to go through away from the team, in lonely and dark hours while rehabbing to get ready for 2025.
It's a lot when you think he suffered that first injury on November 11, 2023. He won't be back on the field until September 2025 and who knows what the future will bring. Very sad to see but we wish him all the best.
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