DENVER, Colo. — For Broncos Country, the game on Sunday night didn’t have a storybook ending. It was a tale of two distinct halves by both sides of the ball in an equation that just fell short in a 30-27 overtime defeat to the Kansas City Chiefs (8-3).
The start of the game was the exact formula the Denver Broncos (7-4) have played over the past 18 months: relentless defense with an excruciating offense.
In the first half, Denver’s offense only mustered up enough ball movement to put three points on the board. The passing game wasn’t working—89 yards through the air along with three Justin Houston sacks—and the running game couldn’t string together positive plays.
Then the second half started and the offense found their groove.
“We wanted to play better as an offense and we did get it going,” running back Kapri Bibbs said. “We had everything clicking at the right times, on third downs and we kept drives going.”
But it wasn’t just a matter of will that jumpstarted the offense on the other side of halftime. According to wide receiver Demaryius Thomas, all the offense needed was some old school ground and pound.
“We were able to run the ball. When we are able to run the ball the offense go,” he said. “We weren’t able to run the first half, we were able to run the second half, that’s why we were able to put up some points.”
And points were aplenty for the offense in the second half and overtime. The Broncos scored 24 points in the final three periods courtesy of 340 yards of offense, 279 on the arm of Trevor Siemian. However, Siemian and the passing games success opened up once the offensive line took the game in their hands and established a running game.
“I think we started to get some push up front from the o-line, we were able to run the ball and we made some plays downfield which opened up the run,” wide receiver Jordan Taylor said. “Obviously we would have liked to have done that in the first half to get the ball moving, but it didn’t work out that way.”
To the surprise of the nation, the story was nearly the complete opposite on the other side of the ball.
After giving up a mind-blowing 49 yards of total offense in the first half, the Denver defense struggled after the break, giving up 224 yards and 21 points to close out the game.
While the defense has always prided itself on their play in clutch situations, Sunday night they fell short, multiple times.
“It wasn’t a difference in how we played, just in key situations we should have pulled it out, but we didn’t,” outside linebacker DeMarcus Ware said.
With 3:00 minutes on the clock and trailing 24-16 the Chiefs started their final possession on their own 25-yard line. In 2:48 seconds the Chiefs marched down the field, scored a touchdown and converted a two-point conversion to tie the game.
“We still held them to minimal yards the whole game; it was really just that last drive,” linebacker Todd Davis said. “Besides that, they really didn’t have much offense.”
Fellow defensive star cornerback Chris Harris Jr. pinpointed exactly where the defense fell short in the second half.
“We played the same thing, we beat ourselves,” he said. “We had a number of penalties on [the final] drive, we had blown coverages that we played perfect all game. We beat ourselves, we can’t be mad at nobody except ourselves.”
Not only did the Chiefs drive 75-yards at the end of the fourth quarter to tie the game, they went 27-yards in just four plays on their second possession in overtime to set themselves up for the game-winning field goal with two seconds left.
“They did what they needed to do to score,” Davis said.
While the offense also had two opportunities to end the game in overtime, neither side did what they needed to do to win.
The combination of poor offense and great defense in the first half and the complete opposite in the second half and overtime proved to not be enough for the Broncos on Sunday night.
