Dolphins waste chance to better playoff odds after three late INTs lead to loss to Packers

For all of their talent, for all of the potential they possess and for all the strides they have made this season, the Dolphins are a team reeling at the worst possible time.

A fourth consecutive loss, this time a 26-20 Christmas Day defeat to the Green Bay Packers at Hard Rock Stadium on Sunday, left Miami winless in December and still working toward a playoff berth with two games left in the regular season.

The loss didn’t drop the Dolphins (8-7) from their spot as the seventh seed in the AFC, the conference’s third and final wild-card spot, but it made their path to the playoffs a bit tougher during a time in the NFL season when not much comes easy.

Miami can clinch a playoff berth as early as next week with a road win over the New England Patriots on New Year’s Day and a loss from the New York Jets (7-8), who travel to Seattle to face the Seahawks. FiveThirtyEight gives the Dolphins a 67 percent chance to obtain one of the two remaining wild-card spots (The Ravens clinched a playoff spot Saturday and the Los Angeles Chargers can secure a wild-card berth with a victory over the Indianapolis Colts on “Monday Night Football”).

But playoff calculations, which a month ago regarded the Dolphins as a near-lock to make the postseason, tell one story. The Dolphins’ last four games tell another, of a squad unable to beat some of the better teams in the NFL and beset again by self-inflicted mistakes.

On Sunday, it was eight penalties, four turnovers and three fourth-quarter interceptions from quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, each coming one after another and more costly than the previous. The final, picked off by cornerback Rasul Douglas on a potential game-winning drive with 1:29 remaining, sealed the Dolphins’ fate.

“It was just terrible how everything ended,” said Tagovailoa, who also completed 16 of 25 passes for 310 yards and one touchdown. “Like I told the guys, that’s on me. I will definitely get better from that.”

The second-half collapse followed a first half where the Dolphins once again flashed their potential. Tagovailoa completed 9 of 12 passes for 229 yards, including an 84-yard catch-and-run touchdown to wide receiver Jaylen Waddle (team-high five receptions, 143 yards) in the first quarter that gave the team a 10-3 lead. Miami continued to open holes in the running lane with the return of Jeff Wilson Jr. (nine attempts, 37 yards, one touchdown), whose 1-yard touchdown run gave the team a 17-10 lead in the second quarter.

But the Dolphins only led 20-13 at halftime, after the Packers recovered a Raheem Mostert fumble in Miami territory and converted it to a late field goal before the end of the half.

The turnover started a string of 16 unanswered points for Green Bay (7-8), which won its third consecutive game to remain in contention for an NFC wild-card spot. After the Dolphins totaled 271 yards in the first half, they could only muster 105 in the second. Miami’s four second-half possessions ended with a missed 48-yard kick by Jason Sanders — it kept the game tied at 20 late in the third quarter — and Tagovailoa’s three interceptions.

Tagovailoa’s mistakes loomed large on a day when the Dolphins weren’t able to separate from a Packers team that has been of the league’s bigger disappointments this season. Miami’s defense wasn’t perfect but sacked Rodgers (24-for-38, 238 yards, one touchdown, one interception) twice and held Green Bay to 1-for-2 in the red zone despite starting a pair of drives deep in their territory after a 93-yard kickoff return in the first quarter and Tagovailoa’s first interception.

Tagovailoa’s first interception, picked off by cornerback Jaire Alexander, came one play after rookie cornerback Kader Kohou recorded his first career interception, undercutting a Rodgers pass in the end zone to prevent Green Bay from taking the lead.

“I tried to throw it over a defender, but I ended up really throwing over the defender and [wide receiver] Tyreek [Hill], so that one got away,” Tagovailoa said.

The Packers converted the takeaway into a field goal to take a 23-20 lead with 11:30 remaining. On Tagovailoa’s second interception, with about six minutes left, the Dolphins got as far as the Packers’ 25 before linebacker De’Vondre Campbell stepped in front of a pass intended for Mostert. After the game, Mostert said he “ran the wrong route.” Green Bay took four minutes off the clock and kicker Mason Crosby made a 24-yard field goal to give the Packers a six-point lead.

On the third and deciding interception, targeting tight end Mike Gesicki: “Just not a good ball for my receivers to have been able to make a play on that,” Tagovailoa said.

Even with Tagovailoa’s turnovers, Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel lamented “some uncharacteristic really, really controllable penalties that were absolutely devastating.”

After the Dolphins’ stuffed the Packers short on a fake punt and got the ball at the Green Bay 20 in the second quarter, right guard Robert Hunt was flagged for holding. Miami ultimately settled for a 34-yard field goal — the team’s final points of the game — and a 20-10 lead.

One play before Tagovailoa’s second interception, an illegal formation penalty on Waddle negated his 15-yard catch-and-run to the Packers’ 10-yard line.

“It’s hard to continually move the ball, and we weren’t taking advantage of some of the situations in the first half as well because we were putting ourselves behind the 8-ball with controllable penalties,” McDaniel said. “And then in the second half, it was much of the same.”

A rare Christmas Day game for the Dolphins — it was the franchise’s fourth-ever and first since a 2006 home loss to the Jets — marked the second-coldest home game in team history. The 46-degree temperature at kickoff only trails a Christmas Eve game in 1989 against the Kansas City Chiefs.

On the Friday before the game, McDaniel was asked about the prospects of starting a winning streak that could propel the Dolphins to the playoffs and potentially beyond. McDaniel said he wasn’t concerned about such things and noted how the team has to focus on winning one to try to start turning things around.

The Dolphins’ playoff hopes are still right in front of them and could be realized in just a few days. But as they stare at another loss, Miami more resembles a team fading down the stretch than one ready to contend.

“We’re a way better team than we’ve been showing,” Waddle said. “We just have to take it one game at a time and one practice at a time.”