Tee Higgins battles through injuries to deliver epic performance

Higgins went on off Saturday and helped the Bengals keep their playoff hopes alive.

The Cincinnati Bengals evened up their record at 8-8 with a win over the Denver Broncos on Saturday night in a back-and-forth game, winning in overtime by a score of 30-24.

The defense was inconsistent, Ja’Marr Chase dropped a touchdown pass in the first half, and Cade York missed a 33-yard field goal in overtime that could have won the game a few minutes earlier.

The only consistent people Zac Taylor had to rely on Saturday night were Joe Burrow and Tee Higgins.

Burrow is ending an MVP-caliber season, and we’ve seen his magic all season, but Higgins, who was questionable after being limited in practice all week with ankle and knee injuries, was the real star against the Broncos.

He finished the game with 11 receptions for 131 yards and three touchdowns, but each touchdown came in key moments, and he had several clutch catches throughout regulation and overtime.

The Bengals offense drove down the field between the 20s in the first quarter twice, and on both drives, they turned the ball over on downs after failing to convert on fourth down. It wasn’t until Burrow found Higgins in the end zone with less than two minutes remaining in the first half for the team’s first score.

The Bengals went into the locker room at halftime, score: Burrow/Higgins 7 – Broncos 3.

In the second half, Burrow and Higgins went off, but it wasn’t until early in the fourth quarter that they connected for a touchdown again. With 11:33 left in regulation, Burrow threw a pass up to Higgins in the corner of the end zone, and the 6-foot-4 wide receiver high-pointed the pass over Riley Moss for the team’s second touchdown of the game.

At this point, Burrow and Higgins accounted for 14 of the team’s 17 points.

The duo continued their work in overtime, where Higgins helped the Bengals’ offense finally beat a team with a winning record in 2024.

With just over one minute remaining in overtime, the Bengals had the ball on the Broncos’ 35-yard line. Unwilling to give Cade York another chance from this distance after the kicker missed from 33 yards earlier in overtime, Burrow and the offense went to work on at least giving York another shot from a closer distance.

On second down, Burrow found Higgins open deep down the left sideline after the wide receiver once again beat Moss and dropped a pass right in the bucket before Higgins was forced out of bounds by Brandon Jones. The Bengals were set up on the three-yard line.

On the very next play, Burrow saw Higgins was once again singled up on Moss and hit him on a quick out in the corner of the end zone, officially giving the Bengals a 30-24 win in overtime and keeping their slim playoff hopes alive with a walk-off touchdown.

Ja’Marr Chase is the best wide receiver in the league, but on Saturday, for much of the game, he was being covered by Pat Surtain II, who is PFF’s highest-ranked cornerback in the league for the 2024 season. Chase still finished with nine receptions for 102 yards, but while Surtain was busy with Chase, Higgins just wore Moss out, and he did it while he wasn’t at 100 percent.

If this wasn’t a statement to Mike Brown and Katie Blackburn from the team’s fifth-year wide receiver, I don’t know what is, and that statement was “pay me!”

Imagine a game where Chase is bottled up by a cornerback or is doubled when Higgins isn’t around. We don’t have to imagine; we’ve seen it, and it results in tight end Mike Gesicki being the team’s second-leading receiver.

Having Higgins on the field forces defenses to single up on both receivers, unable to ignore one or the other, or drop into zone coverage and hope the pass rush gets to Burrow before he finds a hole in the coverage. If they do find a way to double up both receivers, it leaves things wide open for Gesicki, Andrei Iosivas, or running backs out of the backfield.

The Bengals aren’t in control of their destiny. They still need to beat the Steelers in Pittsburgh in Week 18, they need the Colts and Dolphins to lose at least one game each over the last two weeks, and they need the Chiefs to beat the Broncos in Week 18 as well.

It’s unclear if all, or any of that, will come to pass, but what is clear is the Bengals, with the trio of Burrow, Chase, and Higgins, can beat any team in the league on any given Sunday and will be dangerous if they do snake their way into the playoffs.

Much of that is because Higgins is capable of putting on the kind of show he did on Saturday.

All from a guy who wasn’t sure if he was going to play.

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