KANSAS CITY – The Colts are somewhat of an upstart, in that this franchise hasn't made the playoffs since 2020 and hasn't won its division since 2014, yet has eight wins and remains firmly in control of its postseason destiny. The Kansas City Chiefs have represented the AFC in five of the last six Super Bowls, winning three Lombardi Trophies while establishing themselves as a modern dynasty in the NFL.
The difference there showed up on Sunday, as it was the Chiefs who made the plays they needed down the stretch – on offense and defense – against a Colts team that squandered an 11-point lead in the fourth quarter to lose, 23-20, in overtime at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.
"We gotta learn how to win these type of games," linebacker Zaire Franklin said. "The learning curve can't be long. I feel like we didn't play up to the standard that we wanted to play at, but credit to them — they've been in that type of situation and made the plays that they had to make.
"... They made championship-level plays. And we gotta be better if we're going to be the type of team we want to be this year."
The team the Colts want to be is, ultimately, a real contender in the AFC – the type of team that can go toe-to-toe with the NFL's Goliaths and emerge with a win. The Colts have wins over good teams this year – namely, the Denver Broncos (9-2) and Los Angeles Chargers (7-4) – but two of their three losses have come to the two of the four most recent Super Bowl champions in the Chiefs (2019, 2022, 2023 seasons) and Los Angeles Rams (2021).
"They've been Super Bowl contenders for the past seven, eight years," cornerback Charvarius Ward Sr., who played for the Chiefs from 2018-2021, said. "So we got to kind of get over that hump to be a great team. We gotta beat the best teams and I feel like we this close but we not there yet."
The Colts' loss on Sunday was Kansas City's first one-score win of the season – despite having guys like head coach Andy Reid and defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo patrolling the sidelines, and Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and Chris Jones on the field, the Chiefs were 0-5 in one-score games entering Sunday. Some of that was due to bad luck for Kansas City, but "luck" in a game is not necessarily an either-or thing – and the Colts, certainly, did not feel like they lost in Week 12 because of bad luck.
The mood in the Colts' locker room was that they lost because, collectively, they didn't make the sort of key late-game plays the Chiefs did.
Whether it was stuffing running back Jonathan Taylor for a two-yard loss on a third-and-one in overtime, or Mahomes finding wide receiver Rashee Rice for a 19-yard gain on a fourth-and-three with just over three minutes to go, or Spagnuolo dialing up a pressure that forced Jones to throw incomplete on a third-and-three near midfield in the fourth quarter, or a third-and-seven 31-yarder from Mahomes to wide receiver Xavier Worthy in overtime – the final 20-something minutes on Sunday were almost exclusively defined by the Chiefs.
"We just gotta be better," Pittman said. "You guys saw it. We gotta execute better and get a better result than that."
"We definitely left that game out there," wide receiver Alec Pierce said.
"(Mahomes) is a Hall of Fame-level player. After a while, that levee's gonna break," Franklin said. "We gotta make the plays that we can make to get him off the field and win the game."
Veterans across the Colts' locker room pointed to Sunday's game as one this team will have to learn from – and learn from quickly. On offense, Pittman alluded to the challenges that lie ahead for the Colts in facing some of the NFL's best defenses, including the Houston Texans (Weeks 13 and 18) and Seattle Seahawks (Week 15), among others.
"There's no need to panic, but we just gotta know that our schedule doesn't get any easier from here on out," Pittman said. "We're gonna see a lot of good defenses and we gotta be able to respond."
And defensively, while the Colts were on the field for 42:35 and 91 plays, there were no excuses being made there.
"We just got to get over the hump to beat those type of teams," Ward said. "They got Hall of Famers at almost every level, even the coach is a Hall of Famer, so it just shows us we in the fight, we right there, but got to get a little bit better."
In one sense, the Colts' belief in what this team can accomplish wasn't shaken by what transpired on Sunday in Kansas City – even during the fourth quarter and overtime. But in another sense, the Colts saw what late-game playmaking looked like from a that's been there and done that, and understands they need to collectively make those type of plays if they want to become that team they believe they can be.
"We're gonna be in this situation again," Franklin said. "It might be against them again, and next time we're gonna come out with a better result."
