Commanders Win 'About Resilience' Says Coach Ron Rivera
DENVER, Co. -- The Washington Commanders pulled off a crazy 35-33 win over the Denver Broncos to advance to 2-0 on the year.
Winning back-to-back games is something Commanders may not feel familiar with because the franchise hasn't done that since the 2011 NFL Season.
"It's a little bit about the resilience but also tells us we've got to stop putting ourselves in that position to be very honest with you," coach Ron Rivera said. "It's disappointing that first quarter and the first two phases the offensive and defense we've got to understand you're really good and this is a really good team, they're going to make it harder, and this was about as hard as it got."
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Resilience is important, and it took a bounceback performance from second-year quarterback Sam Howell who had some struggles in Week 1, to get the job done.
Hitting career highs in yards (299), completion percentage (69%), and touchdown passes (2), Howell was happy to win the game but agreed with his head coach.
"Good," Howell said when asked how he felt following a second-straight fourth-quarter comeback. "At the same time, I would not like to be in that position every week. We felt like we could move the ball on these guys. It was just a matter of playing clean football and limiting sacks in the first half, which was a big thing...We felt like we were doing a good job and had a good game plan. We just need to play better and execute."
The gameplan was certainly effective and it resulted in 18 successful first-down plays on 37 tries meaning nearly half of Washington's calls in that situation resulted in gains of four yards or more.
Part of what worked so well on Sunday was Howell's willingness to take underneath open routes on first downs that set up very manageable second downs for most of the day.
Of course, he can only take advantage of routes available, and that's where assistant head coach / offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy comes in.
It's a true team effort with the Commanders, and as long as that's the engine propelling them into the next week they'll have chances to correct mistakes, and perhaps win some games many don't think they should be.
Starting next week back home against the Buffalo Bills, looking for three in a row.
