Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs' dominant offense never had the opportunity to touch the ball in overtime of the AFC Championship Game, as the New England Patriots won the coin toss and proceeded to march down the field at Arrowhead Stadium and score a game-winning touchdown. While that outcome left the team and its fans extremely frustrated, superstar tight end Travis Kelce insists he isn't dwelling on it because “the rules are the rules.”
“You can say it’s frustrating,” he said, per Pro Football Talk's Mike Florio. “It’s the way the game played out. Those are the rules, the rules are the rules, you know that going into overtime. You’ve just got to lean on your defense or your teammates to try and come up with a few plays and get you the ball back. But hats off the to the Patriots for what they did. They stuck it out. The moved the ball down field and sure enough they won the game because of it.”
If it was up to the Chiefs, the NFL's current overtime rules wouldn't be the rules for long. In March, the team submitted a proposal to the competition committee that would allow both teams to possess the ball even if the first team that touches it scores. The proposal, however, was voted down at the NFL's annual owners meeting in Phoenix.
The Patriots beat the Chiefs 38-31 in the AFC Championship Game, converting three third-and-longs against Kansas City's porous defense to punch their ticket to the Super Bowl. The Chiefs have drastically overhauled their defense in the offseason, hiring Steve Spagnuolo as defensive coordinator, trading for star edge defender Frank Clark, and moving on from some several veteran stalwarts, including Eric Berry and Justin Houston.
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