(610 Sports) – Ja’Marr Chase caught three touchdown passes, Joe Burrow grabbed two franchise single-season passing records and the Cincinnati Bengals won a shootout with the Kansas City Chiefs to clinch the AFC North title.
The Bengals trailed most of the game, but took their first lead in the fourth quarter and never again fell behind in a 34-31 shootout win at Paul Brown Stadium. Evan McPherson connected on a 20-yd FG to seal it for Cincinnati as time expired.
The Bengals were helped by an illegal use of hands penalty on the defense on a fourth-down incompletion from the 1-yard line with 50 seconds left. They were able to run down the clock with Brandon Allen kneeling before McPherson stepped in with two seconds left.
Patrick Mahomes had led his team to four straight touchdown drives in the first half to build a lead, and the Chiefs never reached the end zone again. Butker’s field goal accounted for their only points of the second half. Mahomes finished with 259 yards and two touchdowns on 26-for-35 passing, most of that coming in the first half.
Burrow completed 30 of 39 passes for 446 yards to push his season total to 4,611 yards and 34 touchdowns, besting the team’s previous records of 4,293 yards and 33 touchdowns set by Andy Dalton in 2013. Chase finished with an NFL rookie record of 266 yards and three touchdowns on 11 catches and is the first rookie to record multiple 200-yard receiving games in the same season.
