Chiefs dominate Steelers, lock up one seed
The Kansas City Chiefs (15-1) defeat the Steelers (10-6) in Pittsburgh, 29-10 after forcing two turnovers and getting big days from Mahomes, Kelce and Worthy.
With quarterback Patrick Mahomes nursing an ankle injury, defensive tackle Chris Jones a calf and countless others dealing with at least something the Kansas City Chiefs (15-1) can now rest up for 24 or 25 days for another playoff run. It is quite the Christmas present for a team that has played a whole season-plus worth of football through playoff games over the last few years and they did it by absolutely dominating a team that came into the day at the top of the AFC North standings, the Pittsburgh Steelers (10-6).
“It'll definitely help with some of the guys that are banged up,” head coach Andy Reid said in regard to the extended rest they now have at their exposal. “Get guys back and freshen up a little bit, I think will be a positive for us.”
After posting what many thought was their most complete performance four days ago at home against the Houston Texans, the Chiefs traveled to Pittsburgh on Christmas Day and put the league on notice with their performance. There is not much of an argument that this was their best game of the season, and they did it through all three phases of the game after beating the Steelers 29-10 with big numbers from Mahomes, Kelce also, registering five sacks on defense and forcing two turnovers.
The Chiefs are now riding a six-game win streak and just won three games in an 11-day span, playing their best football when it matters most as they gear up to be the first team to win three Super Bowls in a row. After the game against the Texans, Reid complimented his squad stating it was their best game of the season. When posed with the same question this week, he had the same answer.
“I'd probably say yes, where all three phases were rolling,” Reid said. “The important thing is that we continue that and then we keep getting better and not flatten off, not go backward but keep climbing on that.”
Mahomes, who once stood at six touchdowns and eight interceptions on the season after week seven, now has a 26-11 touchdown-to-interception ratio after throwing three touchdowns on Sunday with no picks. Mahomes has not thrown a pick since November 17th against the Buffalo Bills when they took their one and only loss of the season. After a shaky start to the season, Mahomes is suddenly top-five in the league in passing.
Against Pittsburgh, he tossed for 320 yards, his second-highest total of the season and did it against PFF’s fourth-ranked defense. It was his highest quarterback rating of the season after he did all of this completing over 76 percent of his passes. He spread the wealth on his touchdown passes, completing them to wide receivers Xavier Worthy and Justin Watson, with the final one going to a wide-open Travis Kelce.
“We've gotten better and better,” Mahomes said. “Before Hollywood got here Xavier started playing better. being more confident. I got a better chemistry with him, other guys that stepped up started making plays and then it's like you throw Hollywood in there and it kind of sets everybody perfectly in their roles and you saw that today. I don't know the exact stats but it seemed like we spread the ball around really well and guys made plays and when you have that many weapons out there it's hard for defenses to account for and Hollywood's made a huge impact on this offense.”
Kansas City jumped out to a quick, 13-0 lead after the defense started the game with a three-and-out, followed by a 25-yard punt return by Nikko Remigio and an 8-play drive that ended in a Worthy touchdown. Defensive end Mike Danna sacked Russell Wilson for an 11-yard loss on the first drive and it was defensive end George Karlaftis who helped end the Steelers second drive with a sack of his own. The Chiefs' second offensive drive was perhaps the most encouraging of the game because Mahomes completed a deep, 49-yard pass to Justin Watson, which has been rare this season, before turning to Watson again just a couple of plays later for an 11-yard touchdown pass.
Kansas City did not score again until the second half after the Steelers flipped the second quarter on its head. By the end of the first quarter, the Chiefs were outgaining Pittsburgh by over 100 yards and by halftime, the Steelers were outgaining the Chiefs in total yardage. They gashed them with the run game, averaging over 10 yards per carry in the first half, with a couple of nice throws from Wilson sprinkled in, but they only had seven points to show for it, due to a red zone interception by safety Justin Reid.
Kansas City started with the ball in the second half and went eight plays for 54 yards to set up a field goal for Harrison Butker to take a 16-7 lead before the Steelers traded them with a field goal of their own later in the third to make it 16-10. On the ensuing drive, the Chiefs answered with a drive that lasted nearly six minutes and drove the ball 77 yards, getting Worthy, Hollywood Brown and Travis Kelce involved, before running back Kareem Hunt punched it in from two yards out on the first play of the fourth quarter.
Three plays later, cornerback Trent McDuffie, with a 22-10 margin at that point, ripped the ball out of Pat Freiermuth’s hands with Nick Bolton there to recover. On a short field, Kelce gained 32 of the 34 yards to push the score to 29-10 after a blown coverage had him wide-open for his third touchdown of the season. It was one of Kelce’s better games of the season, hauling in eight of 11 targets for 84 yards and showing a ton more yards-after-the-catch ability than he has all season. His touchdown moved him past Tony Gonzalez on the Chiefs' all-time touchdown receptions list, and he even purposefully took the personal foul after mimicking Gonzalez’s patented goal-post dunk.
“I knew the score and I knew that my guy Harrison (Butker) had my back on the field goal so it's just showing Tony some love,” Kelce said. “Just a big tribute to who he's been in this, not only this organization but who he's been for football, and we know how iconic it was that he would dunk the ball over the goal post all the time and I gave my best effort. I don't know if I did it quite like him, but I gave it a run.”
With that touchdown coming with more than 12 minutes left in the game, there was no more scoring by either team after the defense continued to dominate the game. The defense has made a remarkable turnaround over the last three to four weeks. They did give up a season-high 202 rushing yards while being ranked third-best in rushing yards allowed, but they continued to get sacks and turn the ball over.
Just a few weeks ago the Chiefs were bottom-10 in sacks this season but after posting five more today, they are 11th in the league, with 39 on the season. Danna ended up tallying a second sack later on in the game and aside from him and Karlaftis, defensive tackle Tershawn Wharton registered sack 6.5 and 2023 first-round defensive end Felix Anudike-Uzomah also walked away with a sack. To make it more impressive, all of the sacks came by way of the four-man pass rush and they did it without all-pro defensive tackle, Chris Jones.
Even just 11 days ago, they were also bottom-10 in turnover differential and now rank 10th in that category, after generating 10 turnovers and giving it away zero times over the last three weeks. The defensive backs played as well as they have all season, garnering eight pass defenses and holding Wilson to 202 yards, despite a lot of preventive defense late in the game.
“I think it's happening at the right time,” McDuffie said. “We've talked a lot about just over this year the lack of turnovers we had in the beginning of the season, and this is something that we've been working really hard to get. Things are starting to fall into place and we're starting to make plays on the ball and I'm just happy that we're doing it right now and continue to just climb as we get to the playoffs.”
As encouraging as the defense was, the offense gave a real glimpse of their possible ceiling come January. Worthy was once again nearly the team's leading receiver until the end of the game before Kelce put together his magical drive. The rookie out of Texas caught eight balls for 79 yards and a touchdown, but the most impressive piece of his performance was that he did it on nine targets, showing he and Mahomes are starting to really click and are getting on the same page.
Watson was the third-leading receiver with 60 yards and a touchdown, generating every single bit of his statistics on the second drive of the game. It was another positive development for Brown, who after missing nearly five months of football, again brought in four catches for 46 yards, displaying savvy route running and an ability to get up field quickly in the process. Reid is pleased to have his full complementary of weapons, sans wide receiver Rashee Rice, but he spoke specifically about what having Worthy and Brown on the same field can impose on defenses.
“Hollywood's doing a great job,” Reid said. “We're trying to ease him back in and it's like holding the horse back, man. He wants to get back in every time we take him out, which is a positive thing. He's got a great attitude but to have both those guys in there is a plus for sure. I think they're all doing well, you know, they're all playing good football right now. They all complement each other a certain way, so, I'd hate to just pick two of them out but they're doing a good job there.”
One qualm with the offense was that Hunt averaged 2.2 yards per carry, while Isiah Pacheco did not fare much better at three yards per carry. Pacheco did whine up leaving the game with a rib injury.
Kansas City did all of this to Pittsburgh without even doing what the hallmark of the 2024 Chiefs has been. They lead the league in third down conversion rate at over 50 percent and today only finished three of 10 in that category. Some of that is because on one scoring drive, they never even faced a third down. The Chiefs also rank near the top of the league in penalties committed and had nine penalties for 90 yards compared to the Steelers' four for 25.
After all of the talk about point-differential for much of the season, you look up at the standings now and the Chiefs are plus-97, good for third in the AFC. They also now lead all of football in scoring defense, averaging only 18 points allowed per game on defense. It is not exactly like they are bend-but-don’t-break, either, because they allow the fifth-fewest yards. It is a super small sample size, but since they got Brown back, they average over 369 yards per game and 28 points per game, which would rank seventh in both categories over a full season. In those two games, the Texans and Steelers both came in with top-five defenses in several different categories and are likely going to be top-five seeds in the playoffs.
“It's just it's such a blast coming in and going to work with the guys that we have,” Kelce said. “It's more unique and more different than any year I've ever been a part of because of the way we've won and how we've had to keep focusing on getting better knowing we were coming away with wins. So, it's just the chemistry is at an all-time high right now and I'm excited that we found a way to get the number one seed and we're going in the playoffs playing our best football.”
The Chiefs will now have at least 10 days of rest before their week 18 road trip to the Denver Broncos (9-6). In reality, most of the starters will have much longer rest now that that game will have no implications, and they get a first-round bye through the Wild Card round. Against Denver you will likely see a lot of quarterback Carson Wentz, running back Carson Steele and so forth, so it should be a relaxing game to watch for Chiefs Kingdom. The one big question that remains is whether or not D.J. Humphries will get back for that in time for him to get tuned up for the playoffs, or if they are going to roll with their left tackle over the past three games, Joe Thuney, with Mike Caliendo being the teams left guard.
