NFL teams
Eric D. Williams, ESPN Staff Writer 5y

Penalties, turnovers, missed kicks: Chargers regress to losing ways

CARSON, Calif. -- Philip Rivers had seen this movie before.

Riding a six-game winning streak, the Los Angeles Chargers got a dose of humble pie by losing to the Denver Broncos on a last-second field goal in a game they led by as many as 12 points and should have won going away.

"We shouldn't have been in that situation," Rivers said. "It should've been about 33-7."

Rivers said Sunday's 23-22 loss to the Broncos at the StubHub Center was a stark reminder of what can happen when you make one mistake after another and let a subpar team hang around.

The mistakes were many for the Chargers. Missed tackles in the open field led to big plays for the Broncos. The Chargers were called for a season-high 14 penalties for 120 yards. They allowed a fake punt to work for a second straight game.

Rivers threw two interceptions that the Broncos turned into seven points. Michael Badgley missed his first kick with the Chargers, an extra point in a game that the Chargers lost by point.

"We say it every week -- more games in this league are lost than won," Chargers head coach Anthony Lynn said afterward. "Today we lost that one."

Even with all of the bad plays, the Chargers had a chance to put the game away late. Leading 22-20 with a little more than two minutes to play, the Chargers had the ball second-and-3 on Denver's 44-yard line. The two-play sequence that followed encapsulated the game for the Chargers. Rivers called a run play to the right, but Melvin Gordon went the wrong way, knocking into Rivers and forcing the veteran signal-caller to keep the ball to avoid a fumble. Rivers lost 4 yards.

"I went the wrong way," Gordon said. "Ain't no excuses for it. When it's the down to go get it and win the game, you can't make that mistake, and I did today. And I just need to learn from it."

On the next play, on third-and-7 from Denver's 47-yard line, Rivers audibled to a screen pass to Keenan Allen that Miller sniffed out -- the same screen pass he picked off for an interception earlier in the game -- and Rivers threw the ball in the dirt in frustration, stopping the clock.

At that moment, Rivers understood he should have taken a sack instead, bleeding off another 35 or 40 seconds of clock.

"I wish I had held onto it, just took the sack and ran the time off," Rivers said. "I didn't do that. I wish I had."

With the door left slightly open and the Chargers forced to punt, the Broncos drove 76 yards on seven plays, setting up a 34-yard Brandon McManus field goal that ended the Chargers' six-game winning streak.

The Chargers appeared to solve the team's struggles with winning close games earlier this year. But Sunday's disheartening loss provided some evidence that this team still has work to do if it wants to reach the postseason for the first time since 2013.

Soothing balm for the Chargers' struggles on Sunday should be the team's next opponent, the 2-8 Arizona Cardinals, led by rookie quarterback Josh Rosen.

"I don't think there was any falloff from our approach to the game, yet we had those mistakes," Rivers said. "It can be a reminder that can help us, hopefully, without any awful consequences on the back end [of the season].

"We need to get ready for an Arizona team coming here in a hurry and see if we can get back on the right track."

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