If it hadn’t been so sad, it would have been the perfect ending.
After driving the Bengals to the Panthers’ 16-yard-line, Andy Dalton centered the ball to set up a game-winning, 36-yard field goal with two seconds left in overtime.
Will Mike Nugent be wearing Stripes after blowing a game-winning field goal against the Panthers?
But Mike Nugent shanked it wide right. The game ended in a tie. A team that had been trying to give the game away all afternoon, finally managed it on a missed field goal in overtime.
Last week, we saw the first 3-0 Bengals team since 2006 get blown out by New England . . . just like that 2006 squad did in its fourth match of the season.
And that 2006 season ended with Bengals K Shayne Graham missing a field goal at the end of regulation in the final game of the season, and the Bengals losing in overtime to miss the playoffs.
The parallels are just too strong, aren’t they?
Marvin Lewis and the Bengals’ veterans want you to believe this is a different team. Personnel-wise that’s mostly true.
But everything else is the same.
They lose big games in primetime. They give away home games they should win. They find ways to blow it.
Coming into Sunday’s match, the story was the Bengals’ offense. Who would step up to replace injured AJ Green and Marvin Jones? Well, the Bengals’ offense scored 37 points, and it would have been 40 if Nugent hadn’t missed the game-winner.
But the mighty, mighty Bengals’ defense — the unit that had bailed the Bengals out so many times in the past three seasons — couldn’t get off the field on third down. They let a Panthers’ offense missing its two starting running backs, move the ball all over them. They couldn’t cover TE Greg Olsen. They couldn’t stop Cam Newton from running, despite his only having 48 yards rushing and no touchdowns in his first four games.
The defense was asked to step up and help out a beleaguered offense, and they didn’t show up.
Meanwhile, Dalton, who had been poised through his first four games, regressed to the quarterback who blows it in big situations. Sure, Dalton was 34 of 44. That’s pretty efficient. But two of those 10 incompletions were interceptions. The first was returned to the Cincinnati 10-yard-line, setting up the Panthers’ tying score and shifting momentum in the second half.
Late in the game, Dalton overthrew WR Dane Sanzenbacher on a screen pass that looked like it would have gone for a touchdown. Instead the Bengals settled for a field goal.
In overtime, Dalton overthrew WR Mohamed Sanu, who was streaking down the sideline. Sanu nearly made a spectacular, one-handed grab, but had Dalton hit him in stride, he had a perfect seam to get to the endzone and end the game on a touchdown.
This is who the Bengals are and have been under Marvin Lewis for 12 years. They are an immensely talented team that blows it when the season is on the line. Jim Rome put it best on CBS’s The NFL Today:
“Good team. Nice coach. Glass jaw.”
Rome said start the clock on Cincinnati’s annual wildcard game loss. I think that’s too generous.
This will be a throwback season for the Bengals — not to 1988, but to 2006.
Who Dey Herald 