Josh McDaniels has to be proud of his team... even if they got an early Christmas present Sunday.
The Las Vegas Raiders were on the winning end of what will go down as one of the craziest finishes in NFL history after New England threw away the game (literally). Rhamondre Stevenson kicked off the series of unfortunate events as the Patriots running back lateralled the ball to wide receiver Jakobi Meyers, despite being tied at 24-24 with the clock expired midplay. Meyers proceeded to launch the football backwards with the hopes of finding Mac Jones but instead connected with Raiders pass rusher Chandler Jones -- who proceeded to score and win the game for Las Vegas.
Of course, this all came after the ticky-tack call that saw a Derek Carr to Keelan Cole tie the game with 32 seconds remaining despite it looking like Cole's toes were out of bounds on the replay.
McDaniels was in shock in his postgame press conference, as you'd expect. But in his victory speech to his team, he was supportive of their fight.
"How long did it take us," McDaniels said, per team video. "60 minutes, okay. I was just telling you. We've been talking about 60 minutes all year long. I don't know if this was the most disciplined effort we've had but I know this -- nobody can argue with how much we fight. There's no way you can argue with the effort and the character of the people in this locker room, OK. And that's why we won."
McDaniels continued: "We just keep fighting, right? Don't worry about everybody else. Don't look at the other scores, all that nonsense. Somebody will tell us when it's time to be done, OK? All we gotta do is control our business, OK?"
There's no doubt the Raiders had fight but, there's also no denying New England helped them out in winning this one.
The Patriots host the Cincinnati Bengals on Christmas Eve at Gillette Stadium. Kickoff is at 1:05 p.m. ET.
