Denver, Colorado Sports News

By Tony Moss, NFL Editor
DENVER (SPORTS NETWORK) ― Perfection.

It's a word being bandied about quite a bit in NFL circles these days, mainly due to the Patriots and their pursuit of the notion.

The Denver Broncos, a sub-.500 disappointment in mid-December, are not a team that has been anywhere in the vicinity of the word this year.

Though in Sunday's 41-7 pummeling of the Kansas City Chiefs, this team got about as close to perfection as it could ever hope to reach.

Offensively, Mike Shanahan's club piled up 453 yards, with Jay Cutler compiling a near-flawless 141 passer rating on a day that saw him complete 20- of-27 passes for 244 yards. Running back Selvin Young (17 carries, 156 yards) and wideout Brandon Marshall (10 receptions, 115 yards, 2 TD) had gigantic offensive days as well.

A defense that has shown its weakness for much of the year was also strong, holding the Chiefs to 129 yards and seven first downs (five of which came on one drive) all day. The pass rush sacked Brodie Croyle five times and forced him to turn it over three, and stuffed running back Kolby Smith (13 carries, 12 yards) every time he touched the ball.

End Elvis Dumervil (3 sacks, 1 forced fumble, 5 tackles) and cornerback Champ Bailey (4 tackles, 1 INT) were among those around the football for much of the day.

The Broncos rolled, and their playoff hopes lived on for a few more days.

"Coming into the game, I was hoping we'd play a complete game and I thought we did that today on offense, defense, and special teams," said Shanahan. "You look forward to playing complete games and it was a total team effort out there today. We did not have many mistakes, and the ones we had early in the game we overcame. I'm proud of the way our team played today."

The tone was set early for Denver, which took all of four plays to march 77 yards before scoring on a 21-yard pass from Cutler to Brandon Stokley at the 13:20 mark of the first quarter. Later in the frame, running back Travis Henry, liberated from the possibility of suspension earlier in the week, scored his third touchdown in two weeks to stake the Broncos to a 14-0 lead.

Kansas City showed its only signs of life all day on the second-quarter drive that culminated in a 15-yard TD pass from Croyle to Tony Gonzalez, but Denver came back with 10 more points to push the lead at chilly Invesco Field at Mile High to 24-7 at the break.

In the second, Cutler and his teammates put the game out of reach and made it out of hand.

"You don't get many of these in the NFL," said Cutler, who posted the first four-touchdown game of his young career. "Teams are just so tough, that it's hard to get victories like this. We could have laid down in the second half, but we kept pressing and our defense held them. We came out in the second half and kept it up on third downs and we didn't have a turnover all day."

One week after suffering the indignity of a lifeless loss to the Raiders, this type of performance was exactly what the Broncos required.

San Diego's rally at Tennessee kept Denver two games behind the Chargers in the division, but allowed the Broncos to travel to Houston this Thursday with something still to play for. And in a season that's been something far less than perfect, that's worth something.

"The future is bright for this team," said the blossoming Young. "But, everyone knows that you have to worry about right now. Each and every game you leave everything out there. This is definitely something we can build on."

The Road Ahead ...

The Broncos will travel to Houston this week sitting two games back of Cleveland (8-5) in the AFC Wild Card hunt, and will need to win and get a great deal of help in the final three weeks in order to end their playoff drought at one year.

Should they win, Shanahan's team will have to root for Buffalo (7-6) to beat the Browns on Sunday, and will also look for Tennessee (7-6) to fall in Kansas City. A win for Denver and a loss for San Diego vs. Detroit would give the Broncos a chance to even up the division when they travel to San Diego in Week 16.

The Broncos would win any tie-breaker with the Bills or Titans thanks to Denver's head-to-head wins over each of those teams, and would likely win a tie-breaker with Cleveland due to a superior conference record.

Denver plays at home against Minnesota in Week 17.

Stats And Stuff

• Young's 156 effort marked his second 100-yard game of the season, and both have come against the Chiefs. The undrafted rookie out of Texas carried 20 times for 109 yards in Kansas City in Week 10. Both of Young's TDs on the year have also been scored against K.C.

• Marshall posted career-highs in receptions (10) and TD catches (2), while his 115-yard game put him over 1,000 yards for the season. The second-year man out of Central Florida is the fourth different Bronco to go over 1,000 yards in the past four seasons, joining Javon Walker (2006), Rod Smith (2004, 2005) and Ashley Lelie (2004).

• Tight end Daniel Graham had three receptions for 55 yards and a touchdown in his best outing to date as a Bronco. The former Patriot and Colorado product hadn't posted as many as 55 receiving yards in a game since 2005, when he recorded a career-best 119 yards in a Patriots win over the Falcons.

• Dumervil's three-sack day matched a career-high, first established in a win at Cleveland in Week 7 of last season. The second-year end out of Louisville now has 11 sacks on the season, and has posted multiple sacks in four games this year. In his two seasons in the league, the Broncos are 5-1 when Dumervil has two or more sacks.

Next Up: Thursday Night Live

The Broncos and Texans have met just once in a meaningful game, with Denver defeating Houston by a 31-13 count at Invesco Field at Mile High during the 2004 season.

The Broncos will be traveling to Houston for the first time since 1995, when they lost to the Oilers there, 42-33. Denver is 0-2 in Houston since last winning there in 1985.

Shanahan is 1-0 in his career against the Texans. Houston's Gary Kubiak, who served as both a player (1983-91) and assistant coach (1995-2005) with Denver, will be meeting both his former team and mentor for the first time as a head coach.

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