One play summed up the Washington Commanders shock 38-33 win over the Cincinnati Bengals on Monday Night Football in week 3, and it only happened because wide receiver Terry McLaurin called his own number.
It was McLaurin on the end of a 27-yard heave from under-pressure rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels on 3rd-and-7 with just over two minutes remaining at Paycor Stadium. The play resulted in what proved to be the game-winning touchdown, and McLaurin’s special catch in the corner of the end zone has already become an iconic image.
McLaurin told Nicki Jhabvala of The Washington Post, how he asked offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury to get him the ball on a specific route: “I went up during the timeout and said, ‘Kliff, give me a go route to the boundary for the game. I called it and I went up to Kliff and Jayden and was like, ‘throw me this ball for the game.’ And for them to have that kind of trust in me, I think that’s maybe one of the first times in my career where the game’s on the line and I got to go up there and call that play.”
Kingsbury might’ve been swayed by McLaurin’s confidence and inside knowledge. The wideout made his call based on film study of the Bengals’ tendencies in coverage: “watching film this week, I knew they like to play a lot of outside leverage. So I knew a ‘go’ route would be good, even if he (Bengals’ cornerback Dax Hill) pressed, and so when I saw he didn’t press, I didn’t panic. I was like, I’m just going to put a double move on him. I had the stutter-and-go. So it was a go route called.”
McLaurin’s call not only won the game. It also finally expanded the Daniels-led passing game and showed Kingsbury how to get the Commanders’ best receiver more involved.
Iconic Play Snapped Terry McLaurin Drought
You could sense a hint of frustration when McLaurin told Jhabvala how “it’s extremely exciting for us to finally get the lid off the rim and hit some completions down the field.”
McLaurin had been starved of targets for two weeks. He’d made just eight catches from 12 targets for 39 yards.
Neither Daniels nor head coach Dan Quinn were particularly convincing trying to downplay the receiver’s lack of involvement. What McLaurin needed was the vertical strikes the Commanders had been struggling to muster.
Fortunately, things changed in Cincinnati when Daniels found No. 17 for two big plays. One was a 55-yard bomb in the second quarter that setup the quarterback’s four-yard touchdown run.
The other was the game-winner immortalised by this photo from Getty’s Andy Lyons, and relayed by Jhabvala’s colleague Dan Steinberg, who noted it “Would be hard to put the ball in a better spot if you were standing 10 inches away.”
Daniels’ arm talent played a key part in making this signature moment happen, especially against the blitz, but it helped to have McLaurin on the receiving end. Especially once Daniels and Kingsbury were told how best to use their premier playmaker.
Bengals Blueprint Ideal for Terry McLaurin, Commanders
Kingsbury hadn’t been moving McLaurin around enough the first two games, but getting marquee players the ball doesn’t have to be complicated. Sometimes, the direct route is best.
McLaurin told Daniels as much when he urged the second-overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft to “keep throwing me the ball” whenever he sees “one on one” coverage, per SportsCenter.
Winning on the perimeter has been a career-long trait for McLaurin. It’s why the 29-year-old has put together four-straight 1,000-yard seasons, despite catching passes from a carousel of largely unconvincing quarterbacks.
That’s changed now McLaurin has Daniels, a QB1 already good enough to be setting “bonkers” records. More gaudy statistics and iconic plays will follow if Daniels keeps looking McLaurin’s way in clutch moments.
