Ravens Win: Pats still yet to clinch Playoff berth
Despite their loss on Sunday, the Patriots had a chance to punch their tickets to the postseason with a Baltimore loss on Monday night. Unsurprisingly, the Ravens weren't in the giving spirit, earning a tough 18-16 victory of the Detroit Lions.
It wasn't pretty unless you are a Justin Tucker fantasy owner. All 18 of the Ravens points came from the right foot of their second year kicker, including a 61(!) yard game winner with 38 seconds left.
Tucker's clutch boot negated a go-ahead Detroit touchdown by Joe Fauria (Christian's nephew) with just over two minutes to go. Detroit went for two, hoping to extend it's lead to three points, but Calvin Johnson was unable to come up with a back shoulder fade he normally catches in his sleep.
This gave Baltimore the chance to win it with a field goal. A 27 yard pass from Joe Flacco to Jacoby Jones (on 3rd and 15) set them up on the very outskirts of Tucker's range. Two incompletions and a short run up the middle later and it was winning time for Baltimore's kicker.
The Ravens win keeps them alive not only for the wild card, but also for an outside shot at the AFC North title. Coupled with Cincinnati's disappointing Sunday night loss to Pittsburgh, the Ravens (8-6) are now just a single game back of 9-5 Cincinnati. If Baltimore keeps up it's winning ways this week against New England, they'll face Cincinnati in week 17 with a chance to steal the division title.
Likewise, the Baltimore win means it's still mathematically possible for the Patriots to miss the playoffs. For this to happen, New England would have to lose it's final two games (@ Baltimore, vs Buffalo) while Baltimore and Miami win out and Cincinnati beats Minnesota this week. If that happened, the Patriots, Ravens, Bengals and Dolphins would all finish with identical 10-6 records.
However, in that scenario the Patriots would lose the AFC East courtesy of a division record tiebreaker with the Dolphins. The Patriots losing out would necessitate a week 17 loss to Buffalo, dropping their division record to 3-3, while the Dolphins winning out would mean wins over Buffalo and the Jets to bring their division record up to 4-2. Likewise, in that scenario, the Patriots would miss out on a wild card as well due to head-to-head losses to both Baltimore and Cincinnati.
The good news for the Patriots? They still control their own destiny. All they need is one more win, be it this week against Baltimore or next week against Buffalo, to clinch the AFC East and at least one home playoff game. Cincinnati's loss improbably allowed the Pats to even keep their hold of the AFC's #2 seed, at least for another week.
The bad news is obvious. This is a Pats team that hasn't played well in almost a month now. It's an offense-dependent team that just lost it's best offensive playmaker to injury. Thanks to injuries, it's a team that is fighting not only it's opponent, but also the odds every week.
All in all, the Pats need to gut it up and get one more win to get those all-important division champs hats and T-shirts. They'll have to do so on the road if they want to this week, and they'll have to contend with a tough defense, an old nemesis, and the league's best kicker to do so.
