What we learned in NFL Week 3: Caleb Williams impresses, Colts continue surprise start

Word to the wise: Attempt a last-second field goal in the NFL at your own peril. Because on Sunday afternoon, there was a good chance it was getting blocked.

Three fourth-quarter kicks were rejected as a flurry of Week 3 games came to a close, leading to one stunning upset, one wild comeback and some history for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Meanwhile, in Chicago, Ben Johnson earned his first win as a head coach while Caleb Williams played his best game as a pro.

Sunday night at MetLife Stadium, the Kansas City Chiefs ended a three-game losing streak that dated to February’s Super Bowl with a less-than-convincing but much-needed 22-9 win over the New York Giants. Brian Daboll’s Giants, one of the league’s six winless teams, have lost 13 of 14 dating to last October.

As for the furious finishes, start with the Philadelphia Eagles, who at one point were down 19 points to the Los Angeles Rams and getting booed by their own fans. Then they staged a staggering rally, capping it with a Big Man Touchdown for the ages: Defensive tackle Jordan Davis blocked the Rams’ would-be game-winning field goal, then scooped up the football and returned it 61 yards for the game-sealing score in a 33-26 win.

“He might have a future at running back,” Saquon Barkley later joked of Davis, who reached 18.59 miles an hour on the return, per NextGen Stats. It was the fastest speed by a player over 330 pounds since at least 2017.

The Cleveland Browns are winless no more after pulling off the biggest upset of the day, a 13-10 comeback over the previously-undefeated Green Bay Packers. All it took was a late interception of Jordan Love, a blocked field goal with 25 seconds left and a 55-yard game-winning kick from Andre Szmyt. Yep, that’s right: The Browns snapped an eight-game losing streak that dated to last season by rallying from a 10-point deficit to defeat the Packers in the final four minutes.

For a moment, it looked like the New York Jets had seized some late-game magic of their own, rallying from a 23-6 deficit to take a 27-26 lead on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after Will McDonald blocked a field goal attempt with 1:49 left and returned it 50 yards for the score. But Baker Mayfield once again proved his late-game mettle, leading the Bucs 48 yards in seven plays to set up Chase McLaughlin’s game-winning 36-yard field goal. The Bucs are the first team of the Super Bowl era to open a season with three straight game-winning drives inside the final minute. Tampa Bay is also 3-0 for the first time since 2005.

The San Francisco 49ers overcame a crucial late-game mistake — a holding penalty in the end zone that led to a safety — to escape with a 16-15 win over the Arizona Cardinals and edge in front in the NFC West. Kyle Shanahan’s team is 3-0 and has won two straight with backup quarterback Mac Jones, who finished with 284 passing yards and a touchdown.

The Los Angeles Chargers are 3-0 for the first time in 23 years after outlasting the Denver Broncos 23-20, thanks to a 43-yard field goal from Cameron Dicker as time expired. Jim Harbaugh’s team has opened the season with wins over all three AFC West opponents, the Chiefs, Raiders and Broncos. “I don’t have the vocabulary to express how great I feel with this win,” Harbaugh said. “It’s taken everybody in all these games. Gritty. Spectacular.”

Denver, meanwhile, is 1-2 after last-second losses each of the last two weeks. “We have to get better fast,” coach Sean Payton said.

In New England, Pittsburgh quarterback Aaron Rodgers climbed past old teammate Brett Favre for fourth on the NFL’s all-time passing touchdown list as the Steelers beat the Patriots 21-14 (Rodgers now has 510). The 36th game-winning drive of Rodgers’ career also netted him his first win in Foxboro. New England outgained Pittsburgh 369-203 in total yards, but five Patriots turnovers — plus five sacks from the Steelers defense — proved the difference.

In Minnesota, the Cincinnati Bengals learned what life could look like without Joe Burrow the next few months. It was a hard lesson. The Vikings trounced them 48-10 in a game that was never close, and Jake Browning has thrown five interceptions since taking over for Burrow last week. Carson Wentz, stepping in for the injured J.J. McCarthy, finished 14-for-20 for 173 yards and two touchdowns. It was enough to keep the job for another week, coach Kevin O’Connell later said. Jordan Mason added two more scores on the ground in Minnesota’s rout. Both teams are 2-1.

In Charlotte, the Panthers smashed the Atlanta Falcons 30-0 in one of the more surprising results of the afternoon. It was Carolina’s largest margin of victory since 2015, the same year MVP Cam Newton led the Panthers to the Super Bowl. This one was so lopsided that in the fourth quarter the Falcons pulled starter Michael Penix Jr. for Kirk Cousins, who was benched for Penix last season. It marked the first time Atlanta was shut out in almost four years, and the Falcons (1-2) could face a quarterback dilemma in the coming weeks.

In Washington, Marcus Mariota left his coach, Dan Quinn, bloodied after an accidental sideline collision in the Commanders’ 41-24 victory over the Las Vegas Raiders. By day’s end, it was a moot point: Mariota delivered in Jayden Daniels’ stead, throwing for 207 yards and a touchdown, then adding another on the ground, in a decisive performance.

In Seattle, the Seahawks opened up a 38-6 second-quarter lead on the New Orleans Saints before finishing off a 44-13 win. The way the first three weeks have unfolded, it looks like New Orleans and Tennessee will be in a race come January for the rights to next spring’s No. 1 draft pick.

Here’s what stood out from Week 3 across the NFL:

Williams’ best yet

It was always going to take time, this Ben Johnson-Caleb Williams marriage in Chicago, so maybe Sunday’s 31-14 win over the Cowboys was the first real glimpse at what it might look like if it works. Williams put together the first four-touchdown, no-interception game of his young career, leading scoring drives on five of the Bears’ first seven possessions and connecting on some of the downfield throws that have held this offense back the first two weeks.

The 2024 No. 1 pick finished with 298 passing yards, including a 65-yard touchdown throw off a flea-flicker to Luther Burden III that spoke to the creativity Johnson brought with him from Detroit. It was one of five Williams completions that went 29 yards or longer. The Cowboys simply didn’t have an answer, at least not early. Williams was sharp and decisive, an encouraging sign after two lackluster starts early in the season.

Just as significant, it was the first time Williams finished a game without being sacked. He presented Johnson with a game ball in the victorious locker room. “It’ll be fun for tonight, then we’re on to the next one,” a much more subdued Johnson told reporters. “We’re behind the 8-ball here at 1-2, and we need to get back to .500.”

Meanwhile, the Cowboys are off to another uninspiring 1-2 start. Matt Eberflus’ defense has given up 68 points across the last two weeks, and Micah Parsons’ absence in the pass rush feels more pronounced with each passing game. Williams was sacked a league-high 68 times last season. Again, the Cowboys didn’t get to him once Sunday.

The offense wasn’t much better.

“Scoring 14 points is never going to be OK,” said Dak Prescott, who finished with 251 passing yards, a touchdown and two interceptions. “Dang sure not with this offense, this unit, the team, the players that we have. No acceptable. Not to our standard.”

According to owner Jerry Jones, Dallas avoided a major injury to star wideout CeeDee Lamb, who left the game after hurting his ankle. That’s the good news. The bad news is the schedule doesn’t get any easier next week. That’s when the Cowboys will host their old friend, Parsons, and a 2-1 Packers team that will be seething after an inexplicable loss to the Browns.

Wait, the Colts?

Of the league’s six undefeated teams, the Indianapolis Colts are the most surprising. It’s not because of who Indy has beaten — Miami, Denver and Tennessee aren’t exactly a murderers’ row — but how the Colts have done it, with Giants castoff Daniel Jones reviving his career and the offense lighting up the scoreboard week after week.

The other undefeateds: the Eagles (the reigning Super Bowl champs), the Bills (winners of five straight AFC East titles), the 49ers (who’ve played in two Super Bowls since the 2019 season), the Bucs (winners of four straight NFC South titles) and the Chargers (a playoff team last season). Indy’s the outlier. The Colts are just the sixth team since 2002 to start a season 3-0 and score at least 28 points in each win after missing the playoffs the year before.

So far, the Colts are averaging 425 yards of offense per game, and Jonathan Taylor, the league’s leading rusher in 2021, is once again running like an All-Pro candidate. He had 102 rushing yards and three touchdowns in Sunday’s 41-20 romp over the Titans, including an incredible 46-yard burst that included a spin move and at least three broken tackles.

Rookie tight end Tyler Warren has been excellent from the jump, and Michael Pittman Jr. and Alec Pierce have formed a formidable 1-2 punch at wide receiver. Coach Shane Steichen deserves credit, too: He sided with Jones over Anthony Richardson in the Colts’ QB competition this summer, and every win further validates his choice. Three weeks into the season, the Colts have yet to turn the ball over, the first time in franchise history that’s happened. It’s early, but Jones seems like the perfect antidote for a team that’s been hampered by quarterback issues for years.

Are champs back?

For two quarters against the Rams, the Eagles’ offensive stumbles continued: A unit that entered the game 30th in the league in explosive play rate couldn’t move the ball. Philly managed just 33 yards in the first half, a low for the five-year Nick Sirianni era, and boos were starting to rain down at Lincoln Financial Field. The Eagles punted on four straight possessions before the break.

Los Angeles was dominating, up 26-7 early in the third quarter.

Then the champs flipped the switch and started to resemble the playoff Eagles of last winter. Their big-play ability returned — Philly connected on four plays of 20 yards or more, and the Rams ran out of answers. The Eagles also came up with some timely plays, namely two blocked field goals in the fourth quarter and Davis’ scoop-and-score with no time left. It was a stirring 26-0 run to stay unbeaten and send the Rams back to Los Angeles 2-1.

Hurts, who’s won the last 17 games he’s started, threw three second-half touchdowns after not throwing one across the first five halves of the season. And Sirianni is 4-0 in coaching matchups against the Rams’ Sean McVay.

“We have pride in this win, as ugly as it was and as beautiful as it isn’t,” Hurts said.

Perhaps most concerning for the rest of the NFC: The Eagles are 3-0, and they’ve yet to put it together for an entire game.

Houston, we have a problem

There were certainly concerns surrounding the Texans ahead of this season — especially with that remade offensive line — but no one could have seen this coming, an 0-3 start that has Houston tied with Tennessee, one of the worst teams in the league, for last place in the AFC South.

Much like late last season, the issues start on offense, which seems implausible with C.J. Stroud at quarterback and Nico Collins as the top target. But the Texans entered Week 3 ranked last in the league in scoring, and Sunday’s 17-10 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars was more of the same: Houston managed just 3 points through three quarters and coughed up three second-half turnovers — a Stroud interception, a Collins fumble that set up a Jaguars touchdown, then another Stroud interception with 30 seconds left that sealed the loss.

Three games into the season, the Texans have yet to score 20 points or throw for 205 yards in a game.

Still, it’s early. Houston — winners of two straight AFC South titles under coach DeMeco Ryans — has time to fix this, and a home game next week against Tennessee might come at the right time. But following that is a road game against Baltimore, the team that smacked them by 29 points late last season.

The league’s other winless teams three weeks into the season: the Dolphins, Titans, Jets, Giants and Saints.

(Photo of Jonathan Taylor: Johnnie Izquierdo / Getty Images)