The Chargers won’t know who they’ll meet in the divisional round of the playoffs until next Sunday, but they now know when they’ll play their first postseason game.
The NFL announced Monday morning that the Chargers will kickoff at 1:40 pm PST on Sunday, January 17.
With the format of the NFL playoffs, the highest-remaining seed always plays the lowest-remaining seed. If the New England Patriots defeat the Baltimore Ravens, the Chargers will host Tom Brady and company in the divisional round. If Baltimore wins in Foxboro this Sunday, San Diego will host the winner of Saturday’s Jets-Bengals game.
Until then, the second-seeded Chargers will enjoy a bye week that Head Coach Norv Turner has called a “working bye.” Players will be off Monday and Tuesday as well as Saturday and Sunday to rest up and heal up, but Turner knows there is plenty of work to be done this week.
“Wednesday, Thursday and Friday practices will be very similar to getting ready for a game,” Turner said. “There are some things we can do to shorten it up in areas. I’m very aware of our guys not only being fresh physically but mentally being fresh and I think we can get that done.”
The Chargers will spend plenty of time working to improve specific aspects of their own game, but they’ll also work on things specific to the three opponents they could face in two weeks.
“There’s no question we’ll focus on us,” Turner said. “Then there are things that teams have in common and it will be zeroed down to a possible, these two or three teams that we could play so we could take different parts of what they do that are unique to them and work on two or three teams.
“We’re going to be ready to put a game plan together as soon as we know who we’re playing, but I think we can get a lot done preparing for the game by taking care of ourselves and working on the things we need to work on.”
