So instead of a 46-yard try, the penalty moved the ball from the 28 to the 14. Dre Kirkpatrick said the team can’t dwell on that or use it as an excuse, even though the Cardinals exploited that weakness during their game-winning drive. Case Keenum completed 12 of 26 passes for 136 yards and one touchdown. If you don’t cross the Ts and dot the Is and don’t do it day in and day out every play with the way you have to do it. I think our guys see that. “I don’t know if “set” sounds like ‘hike” to them”, Peko said. But for the most part, we blocked some things and some of the layups [wide-open deep passes Dalton missed] we’re talking about, if you hit some of those maybe the pressure slows down. “I think that was the name of the game, we were fighting the refs and fighting the Cardinals”.
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Week after week we see a different Cardinals receiver step up and make big plays. Two of his throws landed in the arms of Cincinnati defenders without an Arizona teammate in sight.
The Cincinnati Bengals were unable to defeat the Arizona Cardinals in last night’s marquee matchup between an elite AFC and an elite NFC squad, as Carson Palmer was able to bounce back from two first quarter interceptions to cement his MVP candidacy further with 317 passing yards and four TDs in a revenge game.
A defense that had given up the fewest points in the National Football League got taken apart in the second half of a 34-31 loss at Arizona on Sunday night.
-PASS DEFENSE: B. Andy Dalton passed for two touchdowns, but the Cardinals sacked him four times. The second one, a 10-yarder, cut it to 31-28 with 3:44 to play.
Yet the Bengals took a loss, in primetime, and while Dalton shouldered the weight of the oh-so-close misfire to Green on 3rd-and-2 at the pylon, running back Giovani Bernard could only shake his head in wonder at the effort of his quarterback.
Dalton finished 22-for-39 for 315 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions. Not only did he catch the longest touchdown for the Cardinals this season of 64-yards, it was also quarterback Carson Palmer’s longest touchdown of the season as well.
-RB Jeremy Hill ended up being the Bengals’ leading rusher with 45 yards on 13 carries, an average of 3.5 yards per run.
The Third Quarter: After holding a seemingly solid 14-7 halftime lead, the Bengals crumbled after the half, giving up 21 points in the third quarter, and scoring zero. Palmer followed with strikes of 18 and 20 yards to ultra-reliable Larry Fitzgerald to get the team into field goal range with plenty of time to spare.
The Cardinals were trying to spike the ball because they were out of timeouts when the referees blew their whistles and announced the penalty against Peko.
“Who knows, they get the phantom call there at the end”. But once you factor in the fact that he’s one of the league leaders in missed tackles forced and yards after contact, per Pro Football Focus, and is finally moving the chains with consistency, you start to wonder if the Bengals offense would be elite without him. Cincinnati shot out of the gates and made their former quarterback look like the familiar No. 9 they had under center at times from 2003-2010, but the team hit a lull in the second and third quarters.
The Bengals are not happy with the penalty that set up the Cardinals’ game-winning field goal Sunday night. Palmer went off in the third quarter, hooking up for attractive touchdowns to Nelson, John Brown and David Johnson during what had to be the finest 15 minutes of his career.
Dalton had his heroics, too.
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Aaron Rodgers threw for 212 yards and a pair of touchdowns and Datone Jones had two of Green Bay’s six sacks. “It’s tough for it to end this way”.
