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Denver Native (Carol)
11-01-2009, 11:32 PM
http://www.denverbroncos.com/page.php?id=334&storyID=9528

BALTIMORE -- A pair of well-prepared teams, both fresh off bye weeks, met at M&T Bank Stadium on Sunday afternoon in Baltimore.

While both the Broncos and the Ravens had first-rate game plans in place for Week 8's AFC clash, it was the Ravens who executed theirs more effectively, breaking open a close game in the second half on their way to a 30-7 victory in front of 71,132 raucous home fans. In the process, Baltimore sent Denver to its first loss of the 2009 season.

"You've got to give them credit, man -- they watch film just like we do," Mario Haggan said. "We had a good game plan, we just didn't execute today as a team in every phase. We didn't execute the way we know how to execute and the way we should have executed today. Baltimore made more plays today and they were deserving of that win."

On a physical afternoon, the first play from scrimmage set the tone for what was to come. After the Broncos elected to receive the opening kickoff, Kyle Orton, operating out of shotgun, took the snap and dropped back in the pocket. But within a blink of an eye, linebacker Jarret Johnson stormed into the signal caller's rearview mirror, flying in to sack Orton for an 8-yard loss.

"That's not the way you want to start the game for sure," said Orton, who was sacked twice and hurried more than usual on his way to completing 23-of-37 passes for 152 yards. "We had a number of plays -- it's not just one play -- where we didn't execute and a number of plays where they were just better than us."

As Vonnie Holliday put it, "Today was just one of those days." It was an uphill battle all around for the Broncos.

The offense had trouble gaining positive yardage on first and second downs, and in turn, couldn't move the chains, finishing the day 3-of-13 on third down and struggling to establish a prolonged rhythm.

"We just didn't execute," said Jabar Gaffney, who notched a team-high 43 receiving yards. "We put ourselves in some bad situations, some long-yardage situations -- that's not the way to beat this team. You can't get behind on down and distance. They put us in a couple long situations, and there in that situation they usually get off the field nine out of 10 times."

Conversely, Baltimore's offensive attack -- although also slow out of the gate -- clicked on all cylinders down the stretch. The Ravens finished the game converting 11-of-18 third-down attempts -- going 6-of-8 on third down in the second half -- and seemingly made play after play as they outscored the Broncos 17-0 over the final 20 minutes of regulation.

Up to this point, the Broncos had outscored their opponents 76-10 in the second half of games, and hadn't allowed a third-down conversion in the second half for four straight games. In other words, it was a bit of an out-of-character performance for the defense.

"I think we may have started to press a little bit," Brian Dawkins said.

Although the defense might have started to press in the latter stages of the game, that wasn't the case at the onset of the contest.

The Broncos couldn't muster much of an offensive attack over the first 30 minutes of play, totaling six first downs and 79 yards of total offense. Nevertheless, the club stayed within striking distance, trailing 6-0 at halftime, thanks to an aggressive defensive output that limited the Ravens to a pair of field goals from Steve Hauschka.

While it's fair to say that heading into the locker room neither team had truly seized momentum of the contest, that changed moments into the second half when Lardarius Webb returned Matt Prater's kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown.

The explosive play gave the Ravens a 13-0 lead and sent their crowd into a frenzy.

"I'm sure that kickoff return right there kind of really threw some life into them -- not that they needed it -- but to really start the second half of a game against a team that had done well in the second half for the most part the whole entire season," Head Coach Josh McDaniels said. "That was disappointing on our end and probably gave them a lot of energy."

The Broncos showed their resiliency following the play, answering the quick score with a well-organized 10-play, 86 yard drive, kick-started by a pass interference penalty and capped by a 1-yard run by Knowshon Moreno. At that point, Denver trailed just 13-7 and was positioned for another comeback bid.

A 31-yard field goal by Hauschka with five minutes remaining in the third quarter put the Broncos down two scores, 16-7, but the game was still well within reach at that point.

But once Joe Flacco really hit his stride, there was little anyone could do to stop him.

After a Denver three-and-out, Baltimore's second-year signal caller guided the Ravens to another touchdown. On a drive in which he went 4-for-4 for 63 yards, Flacco helped Baltimore convert four third down attempts, none bigger than the last, when he hooked up with Derrick Mason for a 20-yard touchdown on a 3rd-and-8 moments into the fourth quarter to give the home team a 23-7 advantage.

Flacco eluded pressure all day -- whether it be Dawkins racing in for a sack or Elvis Dumervil around the edge - and finished the game an efficient 20-of-25 for 175 yards.

"He made a lot of tough plays under duress today -- he has shown the ability to do that before, it didn't surprise us that he was tough to get down in the pocket," McDaniels said. "He doesn't easily give up on plays. This guy, a lot like the guy we're going to get ready to play this coming week (Ben Roethlisberger), there's not much give-up in Joe Flacco. He showed the ability to keep some plays alive and it really hurt us."

Andra Davisis, who notched nine tackles and a sack, echoed similar sentiments about Flacco's performance.

"He managed the game well for them," Davis said. "He didn't force anything. He really didn't give us a lot of chances for picks by not forcing the ball -- he took the check-downs when he needed to."

While Flacco was busy delivering the ball to his arsenal of weapons in the game's waning moments, Denver's offense struggled to move the ball past midfield -- earning one first down over the first 13-and-a-half minutes of the fourth quarter.

And after the Ravens added a late score right before the two-minute warning -- a five-minute, 9-play, 53-yard drive that ended with a 7-yard touchdown run by Ray Rice, who finished with 84 rushing yards on 23 carries -- Baltimore held a 30-7 lead and had sealed the victory.

Although the outcome wasn't what the Broncos had hoped for, they knew facing a talent-filled roster on its home turf was going to be no easy feat. And despite the loss, as Dumervil put it, "It is no time to panic."

By the same token, players from both sides of the ball realize there is plenty of work to do and plenty of areas to correct moving forward as the team gears up for a Monday night matchup with Pittsburgh next week.

"We expected to play a whole lot better than what we did, but we'll be OK," Gaffney said. "We'll bounce back and get back to working to be ready for the next one."

jlarsiii
11-02-2009, 12:43 PM
It is weird to say this but I am almost happy that our team lost. The reason for this is that we can learn so much from this loss that should be able to help us down the road. After all, it was hard to believe that this team would go undefeated.

Overall I think our defense played well. They just ended up out on the field for too long to keep Bmore's offense held in check. I remember a specific sequence where Elvis was called for back to back offsides penalties which eventually lead to a bmore touchdown. If that didn't happen and we held there maybe the outcome would have been a closer match. It showed some flaws in our defense which hopefully they can shore up.

Our O-line was exposed in stretches. Bmore did a good job of bringing different fronts which seemed to confuse the blocking assignments. Hamilton did not have a good game in particular. At times he looked like a turn style. We could not run the ball effectively, and the blocking was just not there to get the passing game going. The turnover by Knowshon really ended up hurting us. They scored and gained more confidence from it.

Our ST got abused. That return kick against us may have been the turning point of the game. I believe Royal pressed too much taking the ball out from the end zone. Several times he was stopped well short of the 20 yard line. Field position definitely hurt us all game long. That part was difficult to stomach for me. This is still the area of most need. Our new punter needs to speed up his cadence so that it isn't a "near block" every time he punts. I fully expect this area to be worked on the most in practice since it hurt us the most during this game.

All we can do is try to learn from where the team made mistakes. Hopefully they will come out a better team from this.

Give baltimore credit, they had a good game plan and they executed it. They played better than we did and they deserved the win due to this. Now the fun part is seeing how this squad will rebound from its first loss. We may learn more about this team in the next week then we have from the first 7 weeks of the season.