Ravens have scored in 300 straight games, NFL’s 2nd-longest streak.
Sunday, December 20, 2020: M&T BANK STADIUM, BALTIMORE – It seemed so irrelevant at the time. It was three years ago in London at the tail end of a humiliating loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars at London’s Wembley Stadium, Ravens backup quarterback Ryan Mallett hit Ben Watson with a six-yard touchdown pass.
That innocuous six-pointer with just over three minutes to go could only help Baltimore avoid the embarrassment of a shutout loss, as the game ended with the Jags ahead, 44-7. But that touchdown, in the long run, has grown to mean a lot more.
At that point, the Ravens’ still-active string of regular-season games without being shut out had reached 241 games, and it was the closest it has come to being snapped. That streak has now reached an amazing 300 consecutive regular-season contests after Sunday’s 40-14 win over the visiting Jaguars.
The win – the Ravens’ 130th victory at M&T Bank Stadium, which opened in 1998, the team’s third season – clinched a tenth winning season in 13 years for head coach John Harbaugh, and it is the Ravens’ 62nd lifetime December victory, tying November for the month with the most regular-season wins in team history. Harbaugh also became the fourth NFL coach since 2008 with ten winning seasons, joining Bill Belichick (12), Andy Reid (11), and Mike Tomlin (ten).
The Ravens won a third straight game, all with five days of rest, only the second team since World War II to play three games in such hurried circumstances.
John Harbaugh: We had three short weeks in a row, and our guys came out ready to play. They were rewarded.
The point-scoring consecutive-games streak has been one of the most impressive things the Ravens’ franchise will ever claim. The streak is the longest among AFC teams since the conference was formed in the wake of the 1970 AFL-NFL merger. The second-longest run in league history is topped only by the astounding 420-game streak put together by the San Francisco 49ers from 1977-2004.
The Ravens (9-5) had incurred only two regular-season shutout losses in their 25-season history, the first coming on a Sunday night in Pittsburgh in 1997 when the Steelers administered a 37-0 beatdown at since-demolished Three Rivers Stadium. The second shutout loss came in Baltimore’s Week Two home opener in 2002 when eventual Super Bowl champion Tampa Bay came to Charm City and left as 25-0 winners. It was a mournful, rainy day for a game that took place less than a week after the passing of Charm City quarterback legend John Unitas.
But since then, the Ravens have scored points in every game in a streak that is arguably more impressive than what San Francisco accomplished because of the Baltimore franchise’s inconsistent-at-best offensive history. In 24 complete seasons, the Ravens have had offenses rank in the bottom half of the season-ending yardage standings 14 times.
During the ‘Niners’ run, they were fortunate to have historically-great signal-callers such as Jim Plunkett, Joe Montana, and Steve Young and the durable Jeff Garcia. On most occasions, points came easy to San Francisco until the Seattle Seahawks stopped the streak with a 34-0 win in Week Three of the 2004 campaign. Meanwhile, the Ravens haven’t been anywhere near as lucky, with just two quarterbacks getting so much as a Pro Bowl berth in their 24 full seasons of existence (Lamar Jackson, 2019; Vinny Testaverde, 1996).
Football is a team game, but the quarterback’s contributions are everything. Jackson’s recovery from COVID – he is one of 32 different Ravens to be placed on the list in this most turbulent of seasons – is just the latest illustration of this point.
Before Jackson returned to the field, the Ravens had lost four of their previous five games (including three straight), not scoring more than 24 points in any of those contests. Jackson was playing during the early part of that slump, but since his return, the Ravens – with one of the league’s most prolific offenses over the past two seasons – have regained their potent 2019 form, scoring 34, 47, and 40, winning all three games to stay in the AFC playoff picture.
In fact, the Ravens have needed all of those wins, as Miami has not let up. The Dolphins continued to hold on to the seventh and final playoff seed–thanks to a better conference record–with a win over New England on Sunday. Indianapolis, the sixth seed if the playoffs started today, also held serve, courtesy of a close victory over Houston.
The Jaguars (1-13), having lost all of their games since a surprising Week One win over Indianapolis, are a far cry from the team that nearly stopped the Ravens’ otherworldly scoring streak in London. Three years ago, that Jaguars team was poised to make a run at its first Super Bowl appearance, eventually blowing a ten-point lead and losing the AFC Championship Game at New England.
Sunday in Baltimore, the Ravens – who came into this season with the NFL’s easiest schedule, according to 2019 records of their 2020 opponents – showed exactly why this game was part of what has been portrayed as a soft run-in towards the end of the regular season.
And Jackson played his part, going 17-for-22 on the day for 243 yards, three touchdowns, one interception, one sack, and a 133.1 rating. In addition, the Ravens defense, banged up as it is, held youthful Jacksonville – the team with the most snaps taken by rookies this season – 267 net yards. Despite the return of charismatic starting quarterback Gardner Minshew, the Jaguars’ most effective quarterback, from an October injury.
“It felt great to be back in there,” Minshew said following last week’s loss to Tennessee, his first game back from the sidelines. “I’m going to try to help the team score points and help the team get better in any way I can. Whatever they need me to do, I’ll do. There’s nothing like being out there and being under center.”
But Minshew, despite two touchdown passes and playing to a 120.8 rating, probably doesn’t feel that way now after his running game couldn’t’ get going and being getting constantly pressured into five sacks – two by former Jaguar defensive end Yannick Ngakoue (Maryland) – and fumbling after one of them.
Despite the fine defensive effort, the Ravens came into the game with only one healthy starting cornerback–Marlon Humphrey. Marcus Peters was de-activated with a calf injury, stopping his games-played streak at 45 (second-longest among active corners). Not only that, Davontae Harris had to leave the game with an ailment of his own, dropping that number down to four.
The Ravens got a boost when receivers Marquise Brown, Miles Boykin, and James Proche (also the team’s punt returner) were all activated from the COVID reserve list after serving quarantine periods for close contact; in the process, they didn’t miss a game. Rookie safety Geno Stone is the only Ravens player left on that list; the team had almost two dozen of its own on it at the peak of the team’s late-November outbreak.
The Ravens had the best kind of outbreak Sunday, going for and getting an early knockout punch thanks to a halftime yardage margin of 224-61. They also led in first downs, 16-6, and averaged nearly seven yards per play while holding the visitors under three. The Ravens had no penalties at halftime and finished with only four. Brown led the Ravens with 98 yards on six catches, with tight end Mark Andrews right behind him with 66 yards on five grabs and a touchdown.
Eight different players caught passes from Jackson on this day, including Boykin, who made a fine leaping catch for an early score, and Dez Bryant, who fought through coverage for his first NFL touchdown in three years since scoring for Dallas against the New York Giants in December of 2017.
Even running back Gus Edwards, not known for this sort of thing, hauled in a 34-yard catch to set up Jackson’s short touchdown run. Speaking of the running game, the Ravens notched their 37th straight game with over 100 team rushing yards, tying Buffalo for the second-longest streak in NFL history and crawling with six of Pittsburgh’s record 43-game run.
Other unusual sights included right tackle Tyre Phillips’ 22-yard run with a fumble recovery and Matt Judon’s early end-zone sack of Minshew in the west end zone for a safety that started the Ravens’ scoring blitz. Harbaugh made sure Phillips’ effort was recognized.
“That play was the longest run of the day!” Harbaugh marveled. “We’ve never seen an O-lineman pick up the ball and actually run it and not fumble! He had it covered up nice. He got a game ball.”
Judon’s big play in the end zone kept the Ravens’ phenomenal scoring streak going against the team that came closest to stopping it three years ago. It is said that revenge is a dish best served cold. It could propel the Ravens into a hot streak.. and at just the right time.
The December homestretch continues with the franchise’s 200th lifetime home game next week against the New York Giants, an improving team from the subpar NFC East Division. Kickoff is Sunday, December 27, 1 p.m. FOX will televise the game.
