The Los Angeles Rams took on the surging Baltimore Ravens Monday night needing a win to keep pace in the NFC playoff race. The Ravens are the hottest team in football though and showed the Rams why, coming into the Coliseum and handing Los Angeles a 45-6 loss.
The Rams got off to a rough start, going three-and-out. Although they started the game a couple of handoffs to Todd Gurley, who had a solid game last week, no success was found. The Rams defense had trouble containing the Ravens dynamic run game, resulting in a touchdown on their first drive.
Jared Goff had hoped the return of the Rams color rush uniforms would return some of that magic from last year, but it appeared not to as they had another quick three-and-out. For the Ravens, the magic was present as Lamar Jackson connected with Marquise Brown for the pair’s second touchdown play of the evening. The Rams got in a few plays and one first down before the quarter ended, but found themselves trailing 14-0 early.
The start of the second quarter was much kinder to the Rams with them finding success on a number of passes. They traveled 56 yards down the field, but were unable to find the end zone, resulting in a field goal to make it 14-3.
Jackson would not be denied on just about every play against the Rams defense though. He nearly ran the ball in with under five minutes left in the second quarter, stopping one yard short of the goal line on his 29-yard run that began with him dropping a shotgun snap. Eventually, Mark Ingram punched it in for their third score on the night, taking their lead up to 21-3.
Goff seemed to have new life after a tough first quarter. On the Rams last drive of the half, he connected with Robert Woods and Brandin Cooks for back-to-back first-down passes. After a flag on the Ravens, the Rams found themselves just 22 yards from the end zone. Unfortunately, the Ravens pressure resulted in a sack on Goff, leaving the Rams to kick yet another field goal.
The Ravens rushed down the field with less than two minutes left in the half and converted on yet another touchdown. Jackson finished the half with 87 passing yards on a 100% completion rate, three touchdown passes, and 80 rushing yards on just six attempts, taking a 28-6 lead into the locker room.
Baltimore opened up the second half with another scoring drive. Although it took significantly longer, the Ravens run game continued to punish the Rams defense. After yet another Jackson touchdown pass, the Ravens led 35-6.
The Rams defense continued to to struggle stopping the run game, a theme throughout the night. Ingram was able to bulldoze numerous defenders on nearly every rush attempt. It did not help that Aaron Donald had seen double teams on every single snap and was limited to zero tackles through three quarters.
Jackson finished the night with five touchdown passes, helping his team find the end zone on literally every drive he played. The game was out of reach early in the third quarter, but the Ravens kept pouring it on, resulting in the blowout loss.
