By Zakary Haines
INDIANAPOLIS–The Los Angeles Rams were in a close battle with the Indianapolis Colts but ended up with the win. First, the Rams lost the lead in the third quarter, and then they regained the lead with two minutes and 23 seconds left in the fourth quarter. This is when Jalen Ramsey came up big for the Rams. Jacob Eason, who was filling in for injured quarterback Carson Wentz, threw an interception. Ramsey was able to read Eason and pick him off before going out of bounds with the ball. This play killed any momentum the Colts had as the Rams moved onto 2-0.
The offense came storming out of the gates. Matthew Stafford and company were able to build a 17 to 6 lead. Then consistency issues began to rise. The offense would punt the next two drives away, and on the third one, the Rams punt unit would fumble the snap, giving the Colts a touchdown. The second half of this game saw a Rams offense that had trouble moving the ball. This is when we saw more of Sony Michel. Darrell Henderson Jr had 53 yards rushing and one rushing touchdown, but Michel gave the Rams new life in the run game. Michel ended up with 46 yards rushing in the game.
The real star player of today was Cooper Kupp. The Colts’ defense had no answers as Kupp had nine receptions, 163 receiving yards, and two receiving touchdowns including this wide-open catch. Kupp was just simply outstanding. As for the rest of the receiving core, Robert Woods had 64 receiving yards and five receptions, while Darrel Henderson Jr had 29 receiving yards. Stafford threw for 278 passing yards, two touchdowns but one interception.
As for the defense, they held back the Colts’ offense for a while, forcing them to take field goals. Then in the second half, Carson Wentz found pay dirt when he threw it to Zach Pascal, cutting the lead to three. However, the Colts could not complete the comeback as Jalen Ramsey helped seal the deal with a late-game interception. For the defense as a whole, a lot of weaknesses were shown. One of them was when the Colts’ offensive line had to double team, Aaron Donald. It seemed to work until late in the fourth when Donald tackled Wentz, leading him to leave early. The biggest issue for the Rams defense going forward is slowing down a hot offense but possibly doing so when Donald faces double teams.
Overall, this was a tight game in the second half that could have gone either way. It came down to which team was going to make the right play. This time it was the Rams making the right moves late to win. In his post-game press conference, Sean McVay talked about making the right plays and getting the win. When it came to the performance, McVay said, “To get to 2-0 is something we don’t take for granted. We’ll look at this, learn from this, and move forward.” Up next for the Rams is a home game against the reigning Superbowl champs, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
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