The Kansas City Chiefs faced the Los Angeles Chargers on Sunday, Sept. 24 in NFL Week 3, and here are the highlights from the game.
The Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers met up in a AFC West divisional battle on Sunday afternoon, with the Bolts still searching for their first win of 2017. It’s not very often that I’ll say, in September, a team must win to keep their season alive, but that was pretty much the case for the Chargers entering Week 3.
Apparently Philip Rivers didn’t get that memo as he struggled against the Chiefs defense right out of the gate. On the Chargers’ first drive on Sunday afternoon, the veteran quarterback threw an interception to Terrance Mitchell. That put Alex Smith and company on the field and he quickly found the speedy Tyreek Hill for a touchdown.
It appeared as if Rivers might’ve righted the ship as he began to move the ball to start the next drive. However, he then tested Marcus Peters, which is never a good idea. The Chargers signal-caller was again picked off and Kansas City was again left with a short field. Smith drove it quickly with the help of Kareem Hunt and capped it off with a touchdown pass to Albert Wilson.
Mercifully, Rivers finally got it together on the next drive and, with the major assistance of Melvin Gordon, helped orchestrate a long drive down the field. Going 89 yards on nine plays, Gordon dashed in for the 11-yard touchdown. Following a nice defensive stop, the Chargers again had a chance to capitalize. That’s when Rivers threw his third interception of the first half, setting up a KC field goal.
LA answered with a field goal of their own, though, to go into the half trailing 17-10, but likely content as it could’ve been much worse.
Unfortunately for the Chargers at home, they weren’t unable to get anything going offensively coming out of halftime. However, the good news for the Bolts was that they also weren’t allowing the Chiefs to do much of anything either. It was a scoreless third quarter, and that didn’t change early in the fourth quarter either.
However, Rivers and the Chargers got the ball with roughly five minutes remaining in the game to try and make some magic happen. They got moving initially, but when the quarterback ate a sack on third-and-10, they were forced to punt with under four minutes remaining. They were tasked with stopping Kansas City just one more time in the second half to have another chance. LA failed miserably doing so, though, as they allowed Hunt to break off a monster 69-yard touchdown run.
Though the Chargers got the ball back, it was all for naught. They were too far behind with too little time and dropped to 0-3 overall and 0-2 in the AFC West. Contrarily, the Chiefs moved to an impressive 3-0.
Highlights
https://twitter.com/Chiefs/status/912053674523820033
Alex Smith shovel pass quickly turns into 6 points for the @Chiefs! #ChiefsKingdom https://t.co/PSWSOaB0vG
— NFL (@NFL) September 24, 2017
.@Melvingordon25 gets around the edge and SCORES for the @Chargers! #KCvsLAC #Chargers https://t.co/BFNq8IIh0Y
— NFL (@NFL) September 24, 2017
Terrance Mitchell really wanted us to take the ball back. Again. https://t.co/KDWKy7403l
— Kansas City Chiefs (@Chiefs) September 24, 2017
https://twitter.com/Chiefs/status/912096571344412672
Next: 20 Bold predictions for NFL Week 3
The Chargers really needed this game to have any chance at making the playoffs. However, they were obviously unable to secure it. It would be a borderline miracle if the Bolts could pull that off this season. As for Kansas City, it’s safe to say that the Chiefs are indeed for real.