NFL Game of the Week: Cincinnati Bengals at Kansas City Chiefs

Inform your NFL predictions ahead of the biggest matches this season with Mark Taylor's Game of the Week. The NFL Playoffs AFC Championship Game sees the Cincinnati Bengals meet the Kansas City Chiefs.

Bengals at Chiefs: Odds at a glance

Bengals at Chiefs: AFC Championship Game

After four nail-biting Divisional games, the overall fourth-seeded Cincinnati Bengals take on the second-seeded Kansas City Chiefs to decide the AFC Champions, in what is finally a game for the ages.

Cincinnati opened the Divisional weekend by defeating the top-seeded Tennessee Titans with a walk-off last-second field goal. That’s doubled their chances of lifting the Super Bowl compared to the start of the postseason. They are still, however, the outsiders of the remaining four teams with just a 10% chance of being crowned Super Bowl champions.

The Chiefs closed proceedings in the Divisional Round with an incredible win over the Buffalo Bills.  The crazy final two minutes and overtime win for the Chiefs against Buffalo was the incredible culmination of an epic confrontation that oozed offensive brilliance from two outstanding quarterbacks. The Chiefs will now have home-field advantage in the Championship Game.

Patrick Mahomes, with ample time from his offensive line, put his early-season miscues well behind him to lead the Chiefs to a second consecutive 42-point tally in the postseason. Their first came against the Steelers’ 12^th-ranked defense but their second was more impressively earned against a Buffalo Bills defense that was top of the regular-season rankings.

It’s been a huge turnaround in fortune for the Chiefs, who were 3-4 through the first seven weeks and down to around a 1% chance of lifting the Super Bowl trophy and barely 10% to win their division. However, a defense-led revival gave the offense time to reboot and fix their early struggles.

Mahomes has motored away in the second half of the season, averaging over 35 points per game since Week 12’s bye week and pushing the Chiefs to 2.090* to regain the Super Bowl trophy they won two seasons ago.

Kansas City have faced 11 contests against postseason-level opponents during their campaign, losing to Buffalo and Tennessee during their early-season funk but overall owning an 8-3 record against the best. However, their only defeat during their 11-1 run from Week 8 came in Week 17 against Sunday’s opponents, the Bengals.

Bengals at Chiefs: Can Mahomes continue his impressive playoffs display?

Overall, Mahomes has been an above-average passer when facing playoff-bound opposition. His numbers have been less spectacular compared to recent seasons, but he’s become more careful with the football, often taking what the defense offers or improvising with his feet.

10 of his 13 interceptions came on or before Week 8. He’s been picked just once in the postseason and he’s been regularly appearing in the top five for weekly quarterback performances during the second half of the season. It would be an understatement to say that he’s peaking at the right time.

As a team, the Chiefs have run the ball exceptionally well against playoff-calibre opposition and have scored just over 30 points per game against postseason defenses that have typically allowed 26.4 points per game.

They’ve been above average on the ground and through the air defensively against other postseason teams and have been difficult to score against, allowing 21.4 points per game against teams who have typically scored 23.3.

Bengals at Chiefs: Is there value with Cincinnati?

Cincinnati have played eight games against postseason teams, winning six and losing two, with their two defeats both being by narrow three-point margins.

Two of the weakest postseason sides. Even last week’s Divisional Round win over the top-seeded Tennessee should be viewed in the context that the Titans are barely ranked in the top half of the NFL, despite their premier seeding.

They’ve been competitive in their losses, dismissive of poorer postseason teams, but they do have a genuine, must-win, late regular-season victory over Kansas City as a major encouragement. That was in Cincinnati though, and the Arrowhead Stadium gets very loud during the playoffs and has often proven to provide a bigger-than-average home field advantage for the Chiefs.

Bengals at Chiefs: Game projections

As with the Chiefs, much of the Bengals’ fate rests with quarterback Joe Burrow. He’s made impressive improvements from his rookie season, landing just inside the top 10 this term. Hooking up for big gains with his receivers, notably Ja’Marr Chase, who he combined with for 11 receptions from 12 targets, plus 266 yards and three touch downs in the win over the Chiefs.

He’s helped the Bengals score two more points per game than the average. However, he’ll need to pass the ball more frequently than usual to keep pace with Mahomes and that’s going to invite sacks, which have been his problem this year.

He’s been sacked on 10% of drop backs in the regular season, four times in defeating KC in the regular season, and 11 times already in two postseason games.

It’s not going to be quite the premier quarterback matchup we saw last week when Josh Allen took on Mahomes, but it’s a likely rivalry for the future.

Scoring rates against playoff teams favour Kansas City by three points and the intimidating Arrowhead crowd adds another four. Expect the Bengals’ defense to at least prevent Mahomes from running riot and also expect the Bengals to remain competitive, with Burrow finding occasional big plays, before the Chiefs win by an average of 31-24 and a slight lean to the Overs total market.

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*Odds subject to change

 

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