CINCINNATI — In five days, five months, five years, five decades, the Bengals’ 24-17 wild-card win against the Ravens will be remembered for one play.
Sam Hubbard running 98 yards with all the energy of a stadium eruption at the epicenter of his hometown lifting him the final quarter of the way will go down in franchise lore.
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The picture of Hubbard sitting on the bench, flexing with one arm, oxygen mask over his mouth with the other will undeniably live on a wall of the Hubbard house and man caves all across Cincinnati.
“You can’t replicate a feeling like that in life,” Hubbard said. The 66,399 in attendance nod along in agreement.
There was luck in this play, which accounted for an almost impossible 49.1 percent flip in win probability. Tyler Huntley not following instructions of the quarterback sneak and the ball popping off the hand of Logan Wilson directly into the arms of Hubbard had a feeling of fate to it. Of destiny.
A Bengals game and season so anticipated, a roster so loaded, a playoff run perfectly positioned, an opponent starting a backup quarterback, all these clear paths were on the brink of evaporating into the crisp January air.
The Ravens thought they were the better team on Sunday. “For sure,” Ravens linebacker Roquan Smith said. “Not always the better team wins.”
He might be right on both accounts. Baltimore gave Cincinnati all it could handle. The third round of two teams with genuine dislike each other lived up to the trash talk. The Ravens preyed on Bengals’ weaknesses, finding explosive plays like Demarcus Robinson leaving Eli Apple 10 yards behind or Mark Andrews finding gaping holes in the zone or Huntley ripping off the 35-yard run to the 1-yard line or JK Dobbins making tacklers miss on repeat.
It didn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.
Find a way.
“It’s the playoffs,” Germaine Pratt said. “It can be good, ugly, bad. You get that win and that gives you that momentum. You get that fresh start. You get to go to work, clean up the things you did bad and do better next week.”
Rather than thinking all offseason about a third straight game losing an offensive lineman or another game failing to close out a victory with the offense putting it away, the Bengals will think about going back to work.
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Figuring out how to win in Buffalo with an offensive line featuring Jackson Carman playing left tackle for the first time in the NFL, Max Scharping at right guard and Hakeem Adeniji at right tackle will be for next week.
They won’t be the only playoff team trying to do so. The Bills will be trying to mitigate Josh Allen turning the ball over and the fact they needed every play in their bag to slip past third-string quarterback Skylar Thompson and Mike McDaniel’s inability to send a play in on time.
The Jaguars have to figure out how to not fall behind by 27 and become the first team in playoff history to win a game with a turnover margin of minus-five.
The Chiefs just might have to figure out why they can’t beat the Bengals.
Everyone has warts. Everyone has injuries. Everyone has weaknesses they are trying to hide and overcome this time of year.
None of them needs to apologize for that.
“All that matters at this point is winning,” head coach Zac Taylor said. “We’ll fix it this week and move forward.”
The Ravens yanked the Bengals down into the muck exactly how they hoped to do on Sunday night. The challenge for any team playing Baltimore in the postseason was going to be finding a way to pull yourself out of the mud. That’s not always pretty.
Sometimes, it takes a little luck.
Every single championship run in history has featured a fortuitous bounce or play. They usually end up being plays with names. The Tuck Rule. The Catch. The Immaculate Reception. The Helmet Catch.
Or just last year, ask the Rams about 49ers safety Jaquiski Tartt dropping an easy interception in the NFC Championship or the flag on Logan Wilson in the Super Bowl.
Or even these same Bengals turning a tipped pass from Eli Apple into a Wilson interception in Tennessee. Or the remarkable deflection pick from Jessie Bates to Vonn Bell in Kansas City.
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Maybe this one will go down as the Hubbard Haul or Sam Goes Ham. Regardless, it represented the Bengals finding a way.
They seem to do that, you know? Last year’s run to Los Angeles was littered with those plays. Huntley joins Rhamondre Stevenson in New England and Travis Kelce in Kansas City as the latest victim of a game-changing, fourth-quarter fumble during Cincinnati’s nine-game win streak.
“It’s just the tradition we’ve created here in Cincinnati,” Jessie Bates said. “That’s what we are all about — doing our job until the play ends.”
That’s not the only tradition. Taylor hit the bars again after the game. Delivering game balls this time to Kitty’s Tavern and The Blind Pig near the stadium. He started dropping off game balls in post-game bars last year and the party was on again this year.
“That tradition is never going to die,” Taylor said. “That includes tonight.”
Zac Taylor game ball at Blind Pig pic.twitter.com/sQ5pByGz5O
— Kevin Herbers (@kevinherbers) January 16, 2023
The raucous drunkenness of the downtown watering holes wasn’t indicative of the vibe in the Bengals locker room, though. There would be no recreation of the cigar party from last week.
This was far different. There was a sense of exhaustion. Of surviving a fight. Of relief.
This was exhale not exhilaration.
“Yeah,” defensive tackle B.J. Hill said 35 minutes after game’s end. “I’m going home and it’s going to be right now.”
Much like the wild-card victory against the Raiders last year, the Bengals didn’t play their best. They did enough. It’s hard not to see the parallels to the point it almost ended again with Pratt ending the game-tying drive attempt at the 1-yard line with an interception.
Instead, a Hail Mary slipped off the palms of James Proche harmlessly to the end zone turf.
Joe Burrow turned and let out a deep sigh of relief in that immediate moment. He knew.
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“That’s what it looks like,” Burrow said. “When you play a divisional team a third time, all that matters is coming out with a win.”
Mistakes and the bounce of a ball could have doomed their dream season. They didn’t.
Nobody will remember any of those details, anyway. Not as long as Mike Tirico shouting “The Cincinnati Kid!” continues to play on repeat across generations of Bengals fans.
Against the background noise of remaining fans screaming and chanting “Who Dey” in the tunnel outside the home locker room, Tyler Boyd summed up the bottom line ideally and with emphasis.
“Y’all can quote this,” he said, addressing the cameras. “We ain’t done yet.”
(Top photo: Joseph Maiorana / USA Today)
