2024-09-17 20:10:03
This was a moment an offseason in the making. The reason you pay Cousins the money you do to be your starting quarterback is for moments like this. Talking to players in the locker room after the game, many said Cousins was as even-keeled in the final minute of the game as he was at any other moment throughout the night. A mark of a true veteran, some would say.
“He didn’t blink,” Falcons offensive tackle Jake Matthews said. “It was similar to how we are in practice. You can tell he’s been there before. He just did a great job.”
Bijan Robinson, a second-year running back who played in his first prime-time game Monday night, said Cousins was exactly what the team needed at that moment.
“Having a vet quarterback like that, there’s really nothing to worry about,” Robinson said. “But then having him just so locked in and making sure that everything is where it needs to be and where everybody should be, having him just so locked in like that was huge for us.”
That winning six-play drive saw Cousins hit Darnell Mooney for two plays of 20-plus yards. Cousins was 4-for-5 in the drive that was ultimately capped off with a London touchdown. From Cousins’ perspective, he said London’s separation on the route “made it easy” for him to find London in the end zone.
Both Mooney and Robinson made the comment postgame in the locker room that this drive — specifically — matches what they believe their offense to be.
“That’s how our offense is,” Robinson said. “That’s the real offense right there.”
Mooney: “This is the expectation that we all see with our offense.”
Watching from the sideline, Bates said the composure and play-making ability from Cousins in the clutch was “pretty damn good.”
“Might have been the best I’ve ever seen,” Bates said.
The Falcons may have had a less than 1% chance to win that game when the two-minute warning came and went. But there was a still a chance, a chance the Falcons were able to capitalize on.
“Proud of the way we found a way to win,” Cousins said. “We can build on that.”
