News

With less than a minute left in the third quarter, Kansas City kicker Ryan Succop connected on a 41-yard field goal to cut the Chiefs’ deficit to four and give the visiting team the momentum.

The Chargers had two options: roll over or respond.

San Diego chose the latter.

The Chargers took over on their own 20-yard and proceeded to march down the field in an effort to find the end zone and swing momentum back to their sideline.

Running back Ryan Mathews began the drive with a 31-yard run to put the Chargers in Kansas City territory. Jackie Battle followed with an 11-yard run of his own down to the Chiefs’ 38-yard line. Another Mathews run followed by a Ronnie Brown 7-yard rush up the middle took the Chargers inside the Kansas City’s 25-yard line. Another short run by Mathews combined with a nine-yard gain by Brown and the Chargers had 1st-and-10 on the Chiefs’ 13-yard line.

The next play extended the Chargers’ lead to 11 and began the fourth-quarter scoring barrage.

Quarterback Philip Rivers found wide receiver Malcom Floyd in the left corner of the end zone for a 13-yard touchdown.

“The drive before, we were throwing the ball extremely well,” head coach Norv Turner said. “Obviously, Philip was on. The drive right before that, they went to a pure coverage type-look out of two of our personnel looks. What we did was spread them out and got into some run looks and we were calling plays at the line of scrimmage in terms of the look they gave us. They gave us some good run looks and we got them and when they gave us the man, Philip made a great throw to Malcolm.”

After that it was all Chargers.

Following a Kansas City false start call, outside linebacker Jarret Johnson sacked Kansas City quarterback Matt Cassel in the end zone, causing a fumble. Outside linebacker Shaun Phillips recovered the ball for a touchdown to make it 24-6 in favor of the Chargers.

And things only got worse for the Chiefs.

After driving in San Diego territory, inside linebacker Demorrio Williams intercepted the pass and took it back 59 yards for the touchdown to blow the game open. The Chiefs added a touchdown later in the quarter, but the damage was done.

“The game got close and we really did respond,” Turner said. “That was nice. Obviously, big plays we made defensively. We were able to turn the game the way it did. I thought we played extremely fast.”