The Jacksonville Jaguars faced off against the Indianapolis Colts for the first game of October. This was absolutely a must win game for Jacksonville as they entered the matchup 0-4 on the year with urgency to turn this season around. For reference, there has only been one team in NFL history to start off 0-4 and still make the playoffs. That being over 3 decades ago via the 1992 San Diego Chargers. Numerically and historically, the Jacksonville Jaguars would very well have been scratched out of playoff contention with a week 5 loss.
Matchup Timeline:
The game started out bleak for Jacksonville as the Colts scored the first points of the game. This came on a long drive finished off by a 4th down touchdown pass from Joe Flacco to Michael Pittman Jr. In the 2nd quarter Jacksonville started to warm up on offense. The Jaguars had a nice drive down the field but couldn’t execute in the red zone yet again, kicking a field goal on the 5 yard line. The red zone play calling and execution for Duval has been terrible. Thankfully that wasn’t an issue for the Jaguars next score. On the very first play of the next drive Trevor Lawrence unloaded for a 85 yard strike to rookie wideout Brian Thomas Jr. for 6.
Indianapolis responded back the next drive with a field goal to tie the game up with under 2 minutes on the clock. Jacksonville’s next drive looked to be going well as Trevor Lawrence hit Gabe Davis for a 21 yard gain on 3rd down. That was until Gabe Davis fumbled the ball giving Indianapolis the ball with 27 seconds left. The Colts trying to score late shot themselves in the foot though. On a 2nd down play with 15 seconds left Joe Flacco was strip sacked by Travon Walker. Josh Hines-Allen recovered the ball giving Jacksonville the ball with 6 seconds left on the 12 yard line. This set up an easy 30 yard field goal for Cam Little to give the Jaguars a 3 point lead before half.
Entering the second half up 13 to 10 the Jaguars were hungry to stretch their lead. The offense had their eyes on the end zone after being set up by a 53 yard punt return by Devin Duvernay. On the first play of this drive Tank Bigsby ran angry, rumbling for a 19 yard rushing score. Joe Flacco responded on Indy’s next drive which spanned over 7 minutes going into the 4th quarter. On the first play of the 4th quarter Joe Flacco found Mo Alie-Cox for an 18 yard touchdown on a 3rd and 15 play. The Jaguars next drive didn’t start out great as there was an offensive facemask call on the first snap pushing Jacksonville back 15 yards. Trevor Lawrence made up for it though by finding Christian Kirk on a 61 yard strike. Trevor Lawrence capped off the drive with a nice touchdown toss to Brenton Strange in the back of the end zone on 3rd and goal.
The Colts were determined to stay in the game as Joe Flacco scrambled for 21 yards to set Indianapolis up to score. The Colts fell short in the red zone following that scramble however and had to settle for the field goal bringing the game back down to 7. The Jaguars were fed up with this nail biter of a game. On the 2nd play of the Jaguars next drive Tank Bigsby wrecked through the Colts defense for a 65 yard touchdown run. This effort by Tank brought Jacksonville’s lead up to 14 with just over 5 minutes left in the game.
Somehow the Colts refused to go away even after that demoralizing run. The next drive Joe Flacco found Alec Pierce on back to back plays for 24 yards and 45 yards each. This set up an easy 1 yard score for running back Trey Sermon making this yet again a one score game. Up 7 with less than 4 minutes left the Jaguars some reason decided to throw it 3 times straight. All passes were incomplete and the Jaguars punted without draining any clock. Joe Flacco took great advantage of the Jaguars poor clock management finding Alec Pierce yet again for a 65 yard touchdown. After just 3 minutes, a late 14 point lead vanished for Jacksonville.
Indianapolis had all the momentum, however Trevor Lawrence brushed it off. Thanks to a surgical drive by Trevor, the Jaguars were set up to kick a field goal with just 21 seconds left on the clock. Rookie kicker Cam Little sent it right down Easy Street making a 49 yard field goal. Joe Flacco and the Colts attempted to grasp a miracle of a play with 12 seconds remaining. Former 1st overall pick Travon Walker shut down those dreams quickly with his 3rd sack of the day on Flacco to end the game. The Jacksonville Jaguars finally got their first win of the season sitting at 1-4.
Overview:
Trevor Lawrence played impeccably in this game. On his birthday he broke his previous career high in passing yards throwing for 371. Trevor completed 28 of 34 of his passes for an 82.4 completion percentage, that is monstrous. Looking at the other stats people may question how good he was since he only threw 2 touchdowns and 1 interception. Make no mistake about it, Trevor Lawrence was playing lights out the entire exhibition. Even Trevor’s one interception that the media has called “ugly” wasn’t a bad throw at all. Go watch the play again. Trevor Lawrence threw a typical anticipation throw, if Nick Cross didn’t play it perfectly that throw would have been a highlight reel touchdown to Brian Thomas Jr. Congratulations to Trevor Lawrence for a remarkable win and performance on his birthday.
Trevor certainly wasn’t the only offensive player to impress though. Tank Bigsby had a ridiculous showing with over 100 yards and 2 touchdowns on the ground. The Tank averaged 7.8 yards per carry on 13 touches which is insanity, yet somehow he brought his yards per carry DOWN to 8. While people may see Tank’s yards per carry and argue that Bigsby has just gotten lucky, that is certainly not the case. The Jaguars young running back doesn’t just lead the league in yards per carry, he leads the league in avoided tackle rate at 53% and yards after contact at 6.5. Tank is a young stud getting hit every run and bulldozing straight through it while making tons of players miss. The Jaguars have to seriously consider giving Tank a RB1 workload over Travis Etienne.
First round rookie receiver Brian Thomas Jr. is also setting ridiculous marks for Jacksonville. Brian Thomas Jr. is currently leading all rookies and is 6th in the entire NFL in receiving yards with 397. On BTJ’s 85 yard touchdown he reached 22.15 miles per hour, the fastest play of the year in the whole league so far. The connection between 16 and 7 has been electric all season as BTJ is 3rd of all time in yards per route run for a rookie through weeks 1-5. The 2 receivers ahead of Brian in this statistic are Ja’Marr Chase and Justin Jefferson. If this is a sign of anything it’s that the Jaguars have the next superstar LSU receiver on their hands.
Some other offensive impressors included Christian Kirk, Brenton Strange, Ezra Cleveland, and Cam Robinson. Christian Kirk has finally started to come along this season putting up 60+ yards each of the past 3 weeks, with 88 against the Colts. Brenton Strange has been impressive stepping up while Evan Engram is injured getting his 2nd touchdown of the season. Ezra Cleveland has consistently been the best lineman for the Jaguars every week this season so far. Ezra was a mauler all day against the Colts. That is especially true in the run game majorly contributing to both of Tank Bigsby touchdown runs. Ezra’s efforts earned him the highest PFF grade of all Jaguars players in week 5 at 91.1. Cam Robinson was horrific early in the season but played remarkably being one of 8 OTs to allow 0 pressures this week.
On the flip side Travis Etienne and Gabe Davis need to step up on offense. While Tank Bigsby is exploding on the scene, Etienne has been extremely disappointing as a runner. Gabe Davis started the year off well but has looked like he’s lost a step in recent weeks. Gabe seems to be running in slow motion, has had some tough drops, and had a big fumble on an important drive. These 2 need to step up soon or they may be a trade casualty before the deadline.
As for the defense, this was Travon Walker’s day! This is what a 1st overall pick is expected to look like. Travon Walker was the 2nd highest graded edge in week 5 at 90.3. Walker definitely earned it being tied for first in both pressures and sacks this week with 7 pressures and 3 sacks. This included 2 clutch plays with the strip sack to set up a Jaguars field goal before half, and a sack to end the game. Travon is playing superb this leading Jacksonville in pressures, sacks, tackles for loss. Not to mention his run stop win rate being 4th highest in the league at 35%. Walker is turning into a superstar opposite of JHA on this defensive front. Devin Lloyd and Josh Hines-Allen also had very strong games. It’s hard to say the same for the rest of the defense allowing 34 points.
Final Thoughts:
The Jaguars offense finally started clicking this week and it was like watching fireworks. If Trevor Lawrence plays at a fraction of this level the rest of the year the Jaguars will continue to pile on wins. The defense must play better in the future in order for Jacksonville to reliably win games. The AFC this season is weak as the current 6th and 7th seeds are the 3-2 Broncos and the 2-2 Chargers. The Jaguars could make a quick turnaround into playoff contention with matchups against the Bears and Patriots in London the next 2 weeks. These matchups are likely must-win games for Jacksonville as they hope to ride the hot hand into the UK.