DENVER — With 10 minutes left in the third quarter, Saturday’s game against the Buffalo Bills was all but over for the Denver Broncos.
At the start of the third quarter, the Broncos were coming off a 75-yard touchdown drive to close out the end of the first half and pull the game within one score. There was hope.
Five minutes of football later, the Bills had extended their lead to 35-13 as they trotted into the end zone after a Drew Lock strip-sack. All hope was gone—for the game and for the year as they were staring down their fourth-consecutive losing season.
“Going into the fourth quarter, we needed to put a drive together,” Lock explained about the team’s tough third quarter, in which the offense only mustered nine yards. “We needed to put plays together consistently, lack of mistakes, doing the right thing with the ball, making plays when the ball is in your hand. That was the mindset every time you went out there after a quarter like that. Should have been better in the second half, obviously.”
Scoring drives for the Broncos’ offense in the second half were too little and too late. Denver’s lone scoring drive of the second half came with 1:56 left in the fourth quarter to pull the game within 22 points.
“It’s obviously frustrating. It’s frustrating. It would be great to be able to [put winning streaks together],” Lock said after he threw for 132 yards, one touchdown and no interceptions. “It’s just about us executing and going out there and giving ourselves a chance to do that. We found ourselves at the end of the game not having a chance to do that with the ball. It’s all about pride at that point. That’s the kind of thing we just needed. We’ve got to leave ourselves a chance at the end of the game, if not already up ahead.”
As the 24-year-old quarterback said, in the final 25 minutes of Saturday’s blowout loss to the Bills, the Broncos weren’t playing to win. They were only playing for pride.
In the final two games of the season, Drew Lock’s No. 1 goal is to make sure that doesn’t happen again.
“We want to put ourselves in a position to win a game. That’s the main goal,” Lock said, about what he’s trying to prove in Week 16 against the Los Angeles Charger and in Week 17 against the Las Vegas Raiders. “If we’re doing that, it means we’re playing well. We’re doing the right things on the field and we’re taking steps forward. If we can find ourselves in a position to win these last two games, if not out ahead. We’ve got to hold onto a win. That’s our main goal here.”
The Broncos were never in a position to beat the Bills in the fourth quarter on Saturday.
Coming off one of the best statistical games for any quarterback in 2020, Lock and the offense’s 19-point output on Saturday was disappointing. But it wasn’t a step back in Lock’s eyes.
“It was definitely a bad day. It was not a good day for us,” Lock stated. “I wouldn’t say that any of us are feeling that we’re taking a step back, but that was not a good day for us by any means. Our job is to figure out why it wasn’t, what we did wrong, what we could have done better and go from there.”
Against the Carolina Panthers, Drew Lock and the offense not only put themselves in a position to win but went on to secure the dub. The Broncos weren’t remotely close to accomplishing either on Saturday. Lock’s main goal over the final two games is to make sure that doesn’t happen again.
