Rhamondre Stevenson should have been the hero for the New England Patriots in Sunday's Week 15 game against the Las Vegas Raiders at Allegiant Stadium.
He ran for a season-high 172 yards on 19 carries (9.1 per rush), including a 38-yard touchdown run that put the Patriots up 24-17 with 3:43 remaining in the fourth quarter.
All of that good work won't be the story, though, because of how the game ended.
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The Raiders eventually tied the score at 24-24 and it looked like these teams were headed for overtime.
Meyers explains his intent on costly play in Patriots' loss to Raiders
The Patriots had the ball on their own 45-yard line with 10 seconds left on the clock and handed it off to Stevenson on a draw play. He broke a few tackles and ran into Raiders territory, but instead of just going to the ground and playing for OT, he lateralled the ball to Jakobi Meyers. Meyers threw it back toward Mac Jones, but the ball was caught by Raiders linebacker Chandler Jones, who ran into the end zone for the winning touchdown and a 30-24 Las Vegas win.
Even though Meyers' lateral was the play that ultimately sealed New England's fate, Stevenson took the blame for what happened.
"The play started off with me with the ball," Stevenson said in his postgame press conference. "If I didn’t pitch it back to him, Jakobi wouldn’t have the chance to do that. So I take full responsibility for the play. I just gotta know the situation. Just gotta know what’s going on in the game."
Stevenson regretted not just going to the ground and letting the lock run out.
"The coaches gave us a play just to kinda run the time out, just get down," Stevenson said. "There were only a couple seconds on the clock. I feel like I should’ve did just that and got down."
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Who knows, the Patriots could have lost in overtime. But based on the way their defense was playing, they would have had a decent shot of winning in the extra period. The Patriots never got the chance, though, and the mistakes made on that fateful lateral play by Stevenson and Meyers could end up costing this team a playoff spot when all is said and done.