NFL conference championship coaching decisions: Chiefs nail right calls in the clutch

New York Times

28-01-2025

Conference championship Sunday saw the Washington Commanders get blown out by the Philadelphia Eagles, but Washington's game plan could have given it a better shot at a massive upset. In the AFC, the Buffalo Bills at the Kansas City Chiefs was an immensely entertaining back-and-forth game in which getting coaching calls right in clutch moments mattered most. The Chiefs, as they always do, called the right plays and made the plays at the end of the game.
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Commanders offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury has been making smart adjustments to his offense since they lost to the Eagles in Week 11, but his game plan Sunday was questionable. How he called plays was affected by his team falling behind early, but when that happened in Week 16 against the Eagles, Washington stayed the course.
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One of the more notable results of the Commanders' loss to the Eagles in Week 11 was receiver Terry McLaurin's disappearance from the game. Eagles rookie corner Quinyon Mitchell shut down McLaurin, but Kingsbury didn't help his receiver by moving him around to hunt better matchups.
From Weeks 13 to the divisional round, McLaurin increased the rate of snaps lined up to the right to 24 percent (a 10 percent increase from Weeks 1-12). However, McLaurin again lined up to the left of the formation over 80 percent Sunday. The Eagles don't have their corners travel so McLaurin matched up with Mitchell for nearly the entire game. The results?
Quinyon Mitchell lined up against Terry McLaurin on 36 of his 48 routes (75%), aligning in press coverage on half of those matchups.
Mitchell allowed just one reception for 7 yards on 4 targets against McLaurin, including a fourth quarter interception.#WASvsPHI | #FlyEaglesFly pic.twitter.com/umbdPA5yNJ
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) January 26, 2025
One reception for 7 yards against Mitchell. McLaurin's biggest play of the day, a 36-yard catch, came on the right side. The Commanders fell behind and likely ramped up the no-huddle snaps, which buckets McLaurin to the left. You can't let your best receiver get taken out of the game like that when you can make an easy schematic adjustment.
I also was surprised at how few designed quarterback runs were called for Jayden Daniels. The Eagles defense doesn't have many weaknesses, but if there is one, it's quarterback runs. The Eagles have one of the best rushing defenses in the league, but they rank 18th in defensive success rate against shotgun runs in which the quarterback carries the ball (not including scrambles) in the regular season. Kingsbury didn't call a designed run for Daniels until 6:17 in the third quarter, when the Commanders were down 34-15. It went for 7 yards. He called another designed run on that drive that went for a touchdown. Those were Daniels' only carries on designed rushes for the entire game.
Jayden Daniels takes it himself for a rushing touchdown
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Early in the game, they used run/pass options (RPOs) rather than run options.
0:45 remaining in the first quarter, first-and-10
Here, the Commanders had a mid-zone concept paired with a slant/flat pass concept to the backside. It appeared linebacker Zack Baun was the read man because he was left unblocked. Daniels should be reading him. If Baun flew toward the run, Daniels would keep the ball and throw. If Baun hesitated or slow-played, Daniels should hand the ball off.
However, after the snap, it didn't appear as if Daniels was reading Baun. Maybe he was watching him in his peripherals. Baun slow-played it so Daniels handed the ball off.
Baun ended up defending the pass and making a solo tackle on the running back.
RPOs are great, but Daniels is such a threat with his legs, his running should have been a bigger part of the game plan. Kingsbury ramped up the quarterback runs in the last two playoff games so it was odd that he didn't use much of it early against the Eagles, who play a lot of light boxes. The Commanders were outmanned but the high-volume passing script from the start of the game didn't give them much of a chance.
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The Bills typically don't play a lot of man coverage, but they did against the Chiefs in their regular-season matchup and they cranked it up even more in the AFC Championship Game. Against man coverage, Patrick Mahomes was 16 of 19 for 169 yards and a touchdown. His expected points added (EPA) per dropback against man coverage was 1.19. To put that in perspective, 0.2 EPA is very, very good. Part of why the Bills played man is to stop tight end Travis Kelce, who is still a weapon against zone, as we saw the week before against the Houston Texans, but can struggle against man.
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The strategy worked. Kelce only had two catches for 19 yards, but the tradeoff was expensive. The Chiefs receivers weren't handily winning their matchups but were getting wide open with great play designs, especially in high-leverage moments. Kansas City's running backs had four catches for 35 yards.
1:35 remaining in the fourth quarter, third-and-9
To ice the game and ensure they didn't give the ball back to Josh Allen for a potential game-winning or tying drive, the Chiefs needed to convert on third-and-9. Head coach Andy Reid expected man coverage and he was right. The Bills had a double on Kelce with a free safety over the top, so essentially a triple-team. Every other defender was in one-on-one coverage. The defensive backs to the three-receiver side were all playing with inside leverage because they didn't have inside help. Linebacker Terrel Bernard had running back Samaje Perine in coverage.
Perine was lined up to the right but he ran a flat route to the left toward the three-receiver side. Bernard had to work through a heap of traffic to cover Perine. He couldn't get there and Perine was wide open for the game-sealing first down.
Samaje Perine picks up clutch the first down!
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If you play zone against the Chiefs, Kelce will find holes in the zone, but if you play man, Reid has too many well-designed man-beaters in his playbook and you have to deal with Xavier Worthy's speed and Mahomes' running ability. Eagles defensive coordinator Vic Fangio has his hands full.
Before the Chiefs sealed the game on Perine's catch, Allen and the Bills were stopped on fourth down with yet another clutch, clever defensive call by coordinator Steve Spagnuolo. Allen is known for his superhuman athleticism, but he's also an ace before the snap, sniffing out pressures and getting the offense into the right protections. It's not easy to fool him. Everyone knows Spagnuolo is going to bring pressure when the game is on the line, but the question is how and where will the blitz come from.
2:02 remaining in the fourth quarter, fourth-and-5
The Bills started in empty (no backs in the backfield) and they were in a condensed formation with every receiver within close proximity to Allen. This meant that they had no extra pass blockers and defensive backs had a shorter distance to the quarterback on blitzes. Spagnuolo is known for bringing defensive back blitzes against these types of formations, so getting into a formation that invites it and not having any additional blockers is a tough position to be in.
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Even though there were more defenders to the right of the formation, the line slid to the left. According to Bills sideline reporter Sal Capaccio, Buffalo guard O'Cyrus Torrence said the Chiefs like to show blitz from the opposite side of where they actually blitz, which is likely why they thought pressure was coming from their left. But the Chiefs blitzed from the right, away from where the line slid to.
The Bills called a version of mesh in which slot receiver Khalil Shakir runs an orbit motion. If Allen sees someone following Shakir, he'll know it's man coverage and throw to him. No one followed Shakir, so Allen looked to his pass concept inside.
The Chiefs looked like they dropped into some sort of zone, but it's hard to tell because they busted a coverage. Tight end Dalton Kincaid was wide open in the middle of the field.
Because the line slid to the left, there were two unblocked blitzers to the right immediately after the snap. Allen had to scramble against the grain of the direction the blitzers were running to force them to change directions to buy a little bit of time.
Amazingly, Allen found Kincaid with immense pressure in his lap. He threw a catchable ball, but Kincaid dropped it. It would have been an amazing catch, but the pass fell incomplete.
The Chiefs make the stop on fourth down!
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Unfortunately for the Bills, they once again failed to make the plays when it mattered most against their biggest obstacle to Super Bowl glory. Last year, Bills left tackle Dion Dawkins got pushed into Allen's lap when he had an open receiver in the end zone for a potential game-winning touchdown. This year, they failed to get the protection right and the ball was dropped in the game's most pivotal moment.