Late-window collapse: how the Ravens lost a 17-point lead

BALTIMORE — The scoreboard said 17 with 9:42 left in the third quarter. It said nothing at all by the time the Ravens walked off.

What happened in between was not a single failure but a chain of them: a run-heavy script abandoned two series too early, a secondary that rotated late on three straight snaps, and a special teams penalty that handed away 20 yards of field position at the worst possible moment.

"We stopped playing our game," the head coach said afterward. "That is on the staff before it is on anybody in that locker room."

The play-calling turn is the cleanest place to start. Through 34 minutes Baltimore had run the ball on 62 percent of first downs and averaged 5.4 yards a carry. Over the final 26 minutes that rate fell to 31 percent, and the offense produced one first down on its next four drives.

Defensively, the breakdowns were structural. On each of the three touchdown drives that closed the gap, the safety rotation arrived a half-count late, leaving the boundary corner in single coverage against the opponent's most productive receiver. Two of those snaps went for more than 30 yards.

The loss drops Baltimore into a crowded wild-card picture with a schedule that does not soften. What it exposed — a team that plays its best football only when it is comfortable — is the harder problem.