News and notes from Miami’s 34-13 Black Friday victory against the New York Jets
The Miami Dolphins went into MetLife Stadium on a short week and rolled to victory over the New York Jets, 34-13.
Despite some sloppy play and a devastating injury to pass-rusher Jaelan Phillips, Miami is now 8-3, in control of their AFC East destiny and very much alive in the top-seed conversation with a handful of other AFC teams.
Miami relied on a massive defensive performance as well as terrific games from their skill position triplets of Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle and Raheem Mostert.
Orchestrating this, as the football-like point guard he is, Tua Tagovailoa had a fair game, with two ill-timed interceptions. However, the second was a net positive and led to a Hail Mary try, that Miami’s Jevon Holland intercepted and proceeded to take coast-to-coast for a 99-yard touchdown.
The return score was the third-longest interception for a touchdown in Dolphins history with the second being a 100-yarder by Brock Marion in 2002. The first was famously Louis Oliver’s epic 103-yard return in 1992, as both of those top-two were against the Buffalo Bills.
The Miami Dolphins are 9-5 in their 14 games against the Jets at MetLife Stadium since the place opened in 2010.
Here are some more notes from the victory:
Vic Fangio's Defense epic in East Rutherford
The numbers against the Jets were seven sacks, eight tackles for loss, 12 quarterback hits, six passes defensed, a forced fumble and two interceptions, one, of which, was a 99-yard return for a touchdown from Holland.
New York went 5-for-14 on third downs. Miami went 11-for-16.
Miami’s defense held the Jets to an average gain per play of just 2.9 yards.
Eight different Dolphins recorded a quarterback hit against the Jets and four players did so twice – Jaelan Phillips, Christian Wilkins, Emmanuel Ogbah and Bradley Chubb.
The unit held the Jets to just 29 rushing yards on 10 carries on Friday. That’s the fewest rushing yards allowed by the Dolphins in a game since December 11, 2017 against the New England Patriots when they allowed just two.
All four of Miami’s defensive tackles on the roster recorded at least a half-sack.
Zach Sieler now has a career-high five sacks this season, and Wilkins has a career-high 6.5 after his two-sack day. They’re arguably the NFL’s best defensive tackle tandem.
The Dolphins have now had multiple sacks in eight straight games, which is tied for the third-longest multi-sack streak in team history. Remarkably, this defense is middle of the pack in blitzing rate. They have recorded at least one sack in every game this season.
Miami’s 12 quarterback hits on Friday is tied for the third-most in a Dolphins game in the past decade.
Xavien Howard has recorded a pass defensed in three consecutive games.
Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle Super Duo
Tyreek Hill is really pushing for his name to be the first ever on an NFL MVP trophy as a wide receiver, as he became the fourth player in NFL history with at least 1,300 receiving yards in his team’s first 11 games of a season.
Hill also has the third-most receiving yards in NFL history through 11 games
Jaylen Waddle caught all eight of his targets against the Jets on Black Friday, as he’s on pace to get more targets and more receptions than last season.
Waddle also led Miami with 114 receiving yards on eight catches on Friday, while Hill had nine receptions for 102 yards and a score. They’ve now topped 100 yards in the same game six times since becoming teammates in 2022. Prior to that, Miami hadn’t had two 100-plus-yard receivers in the same game since 2016.
On Friday against the Jets, Hill became the first Dolphin since Mike Wallace in 2014 to have double-digit touchdown receptions in a season.
Waddle went over the 3,000 career receiving yards mark on Friday and became Miami’s all-time receiving yards leader for the first three seasons of a career; passing Dolphin great Jarvis Landry.
Waddle is now only 309 yards shy of becoming the first player in Dolphins history to post three straight 1,000 receiving-yard seasons. He needs to average 52 yards over the next six games to hit this feat.
Raheem Mostert having renaissance year leading Miami's backfield
For the first time in his career, running back Raheem Mostert has gone two consecutive games with 20 or more rush attempts. He finished this one with 94 yards and a pair of scores.
Jeff Wilson Jr. ran tough against the Jets, gaining 56 yards on 11 rushes, good for 5.1 yards per carry. He also caught all three of his targets for 17 yards.
This was Mostert’s third consecutive contest with at least 85 rushing yards. He now has at least 50 scrimmage yards in nine of 11 games played in 2023.
Three Dolphins have scored more rushing touchdowns in a season than Mostert (13) has this year – Lamar Smith (14 in 2000), Karim Abdul-Jabbar (15 in 1997) and Ricky Williams (16 in 2002).
Tua Tagovailoa active NFL leader in consecutive games with a touchdown pass
Tua Tagovailoa’s seven-yard pass to Hill extended his streak to 20 straight games with a touchdown score. It’s the longest active streak in the NFL and the second-longest streak in Dolphins history.
Miami has now won 22 of their past 31 games started by Tagovailoa dating back to November 21, 2021. It’s the third-best win percentage (.710) among NFL starting quarterbacks with a minimum of 15 starts in that span.
Tagovailoa is now 3-0 in his three career starts against the Jets and is now 10-5 all-time as a starter in AFC East games.
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