KC Rises From Ashes

First the Kansas City Chiefs were in trouble.

Then they weren’t.

Then they were winning. By a lot.

And if you went to make a snack, grab another beer or, understandable at one point if you were a Chiefs fan, turned off the TV in disgust, you can be forgiven if you had to do a doubletake when you realized what a wild, raucous, circus-without-the-tent, hot mess of a game had broken out.

On a game that can barely be explained, let alone ever duplicated, the Chiefs staged the most epic of comebacks, needing all of 10 minutes to erase a 24-point deficit. Patrick Mahomes threw for four touchdowns in the second quarter, joining Doug Williams as the only quarterback to do that in the playoffs, and the Chiefs scored 41 unanswered points as they bamboozled the Houston Texans 51-31 and reached the AFC title game for a second consecutive year.

Justin Reid gained just two yards after taking the direct snap, giving Kansas City the ball and great field position. Arrowhead Stadium, which had been stunned into silence, erupted. The Texans weren’t done with the stupid, gifting Mahomes and the Chiefs 28 yards on a pass interference call by Lonnie Johnson.

Two plays later, Mahomes hit Travis Kelce for a 5-yard touchdown to cut Houston’s lead to 24-14.

Off-the-rails as those three minutes were, the wackiness was only beginning.

On the ensuing kickoff, Daniel Sorensen forced a DeAndre Carter fumble at the 24, and Darwin Thompson scooped the ball up and returned it to the Texans’ 6. Three plays later, Mahomes connected with Kelce for a second touchdown and the Chiefs had cut the lead to 24-21.

This game had been billed as a matchup of the two best quarterbacks of their generation, taken just two spots apart in the first round of the 2017 draft.

Though Deshaun Watson made some impressive plays – his 54-yard pass to Kenny Stills for the first score, for example, was gorgeous – this game featured the very best of Mahomes. There were the pinpoint passes, the breakaway runs.

But his pass for the go-ahead touchdown showed why Mahomes is likely to be the defining player of his generation. He had two passes of 20 yards, as well as runs of 14 and 21 yards, to move the Chiefs to the Houston 5.

On first down, he overthrew Damien Williams. On second down, Demarcus Robinson dropped the ball. And on third down, with Houston bringing pressure and flushing him out of the pocket, Mahomes got right up to the line before letting fly, finding Kelce at the goal line.

The play was reviewed, but replays showed Mahomes’ back foot was behind the line. The touchdown stood and the Chiefs, left for dead earlier that same quarter, were in the lead.

Kelce is the first player in the Super Bowl era to catch three touchdown passes in a single quarter. He joined Dave Casper and Rob Gronkowski as the only tight ends with a three-touchdown game in the postseason. 

The Chiefs would tack on two more touchdowns – that’s a 41-point, unanswered run, for those who lost track – before the Texans finally scored again. But it was too late. Houston had come completely unglued, its hopes of turning the AFC title game into an all-AFC South affair long gone. 

The Tennessee Titans stunned top-seeded the Baltimore Ravens on Saturday night for the other spot in the AFC title game, giving the Chiefs what sure seemed like a favorable path to their first Super Bowl in 50 years. But, for a quarter, at least, the Texans seemed to have other ideas.

That, or Kansas City misread the kickoff time.

There was that 54-yard pass from Watson to a wide-open Stills for the first score. A blocked punt by Barkevious Mingo that Lonnie Johnson returned for a touchdown for the second. And a muffed punt by Tyreek Hill that Keion Crossen recovered at the Chiefs 6 to set up the third touchdown.

Add in a field goal, and the Texans had a 24-0 lead with 10:54 left in the first half. Given that Kansas City’s previous largest comeback, in any game, was 21 points, Chiefs fans could have been forgiven if they assume the worst.

But in a playoff season that has already seen New England knocked out in the wild-card round, New Orleans lose at home and the AFC’s No. 1 seed go down, wacky games are the rule. And nothing is wackier than this one.