Jaguars' Christian Kirk Sees Lessons in Second-Half Success

Christian Kirk had a big game against the Washington Commanders, and he sees the entire team's production in the second half as a message.

The Jaguars first-half performance against the Washington Commanders last Sunday was nothing to write home about. 

The offense, in particular, struggled, only scoring three total points, which could have easily been seven if Trevor Lawrence found a wide-open Travis Ettiene in the end-zone during the first quarter of play.

When the whistles screamed to end the first half, there were little signs of life from this Jaguars' offensive attack. They knew they needed to make halftime adjustments and find a spark to reignite their chances of winning this contest. The Jaguars and wide receiver Christian Kirk would not go down without a fight.

“I honestly see it as an opportunity, or I saw it as an opportunity, of who we wanted to be early on in the season,” Kirk said when asked about the mentality shift after the halftime break. 

“You know, quickly we had a decision to make of ‘Are we going to fight through adversity and come out a different team in the second half, or are we going to just hang our heads and say we’re down eleven points, and maybe, hopefully we’ll get back?’ The resiliency that everybody showed on both sides of the ball was great, like you said, defense had a big stop coming out at half. We were able to capitalize on some things offensively, but it shows the types of guys and the culture that we’re trying to build here, so it was really encouraging, one of the more encouraging things about the game.

While this resiliency from Kirk and the entire Jags team did not provide the desired result, it did show that they aren’t the same old Jags, ready to give up and hang their heads low in defeat. For Kirk, this mentality shift displayed on the field shows a clear difference of what the franchise was versus what it is now, with the Jaguars storming to a 22-14 lead in the fourth quarter before ultimately losing 28-22.

“Yeah, it doesn’t happen overnight, for sure,” Kirk said. “I know there have been plenty of teams that people have seen that came from an organization that went through the same type of development as well, so this stuff is going to take time, but like I said, good teams finish. We definitely have some work to do to be a good team and we got to learn how to finish football games because that’s how you make a living in this league and you become one of the better teams, is if you finish games in tight situations like that.”

As the Jaguars prepare for a week two showdown versus the rival Indianapolis Colts, there is plenty of work to do on both sides of the ball. Missed tackles, opportunities at the goal line, and the inability to consistently finish drives were all factors that are going to be among the primary focuses for improvement as the season progresses. While the desire to win will create urgency to expedite the development process, the importance of knowing that this was just one game with a season ahead is what this Jags team needs to persevere.

“Very important,” Kirk said. “I was talking to some of the guys after the game. It’s just the first game. Not to say that it didn’t count, but how we were able to battle back coming out in the second half, and there’s flashes of us being a good team. That’s one thing that we can at least hang our hat on, but this week becomes even more important, and that’s how the NFL is. The next week is always the most important. Especially with a divisional opponent coming here, we have to flush this today and go ahead and move on to Indy.”