Three plays, 16 seconds, two Travis Etienne TDs, one Josh Allen sack swing game for Jaguars

The old-school single-wing play was just installed last week by the Jacksonville Jaguars' coaching staff and one coach Doug Pederson told the offense could be called at any time on Sunday against the Indianapolis Colts.

The eventual timing turned out to be perfect.

Travis Etienne’s 22-yard touchdown run after taking a snap in a “Wildcat” formation less than a minute into the second quarter — one play after outside linebacker Josh Allen strip-sacked Colts quarterback Gardner Minshew — was the turning point in a game in which the Jags flipped a 3-0 deficit into a 14-3 lead.

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They went on to win 37-20 in front of 64,851 at EverBank Stadium, the Jaguars’ third victory in a row, the eighth in a row over the Colts in home games and the seventh in a row at The Bank (one came as the designated home team in London).

While Etienne had only 55 yards on 18 attempts — a week after he ran for 136 yards against Buffalo — he scored two touchdowns in a span of three combined plays from scrimmage by both teams, in 16 seconds of clock time, giving him five for the season to match his total for the entire 2022 season.

Strip-sack of Minshew, then a touchdown

The chain of events began when Etienne punched the ball in from 2 yards out on the second play of the second period, capping a 13-play, 75-yard drive to erase the only Colts lead of the game.

After Brandon McManus banged the kickoff into the end zone. Minshew took over at his own 25. On first down, Allen wheeled around left tackle Bernhard Raimann and grabbed Minshew from behind for a 3-yard loss and his team-high seventh sack of the season.

The ball came out and Angelo Blackson recovered his third fumble of the season.

That set the stage for the next play. Quarterback Trevor Lawrence lined up a wide receiver on the left and the Jags had Etienne behind center in a shotgun, with Tank Bigsby to his right. The formation was heavy on the right side, with tight ends Luke Farrell, Evan Engram and Brenton Strange. 

Farrell lined up outside tackle Anton Harrison, Engram was a pace behind them, in their gap, and Strange was a wing outside Farrell’s right.

Etienne took the snap and faked a read-option to Bigsby to the left. Lawrence ran a skinny post to take cornerback JuJu Brents out of the picture. The flow of the defense went that way and Etienne took off to the right.

Farrell blocked down on defensive end Kwity Paye, Strange took out linebacker E.J. Speed and Engram went outside to shield nickel cornerback Kenny Moore II.

Another key sequence was by center Luke Fortner, who helped sell the flow to the left by taking nose tackle Grover Stewart in that direction. Fortner wasn’t done, however. After Etienne took off, Fortner sprinted out to the right and screened safety Rodney Thomas II.

Etienne outraced Zaire Franklin and Shaquille Leonard to the corner of the end zone and the Jags’ lead never dipped below that 11-point margin for the rest of the game.

Bigsby helped sell the fake

“I just had to hang onto the fake to Tank a little bit, then take off to the side Travis was running and find somebody [to block],” Fortner said. “All I had to really do was screen the guy and let Travis do the work … you know, work smarter, not harder.”

Fortner said Bigsby has accomplished enough this season (two touchdowns, one at Indianapolis in the opening game) to force the Colts to respect the fake.

“Tank’s really good,” Fortner said. “That’s a dynamic duo back there.”

Fortner said the two-play swing was the epitome of offense and defense complementing each other.

“The defense made a huge play and the offense capitalized,” he said. “Great team football.”

“The defense was playing great … lights-out,” Etienne said. “To go out there and complement them with a touchdown … that’s what you want.”

Etienne knew the call was coming

Etienne said he was certain the play would be called at some point in the game in the red zone.

“I knew it was getting called,” he said. “It’s a nice red zone play. We've seen Lamar Jackson run it on film. We ran it in practice and our defense gave me a nice, good look and I knew when we ran it in practice I knew I was going to score. It was a good misdirection. They had to respect Tank and then I got out in space with some offensive linemen in front of me and oh, my gosh.”

Engram said “nothing is off the table” as far as when Pederson and offensive coordinator Press Taylor call certain plays — especially unconventional ones.

“It was obviously a great momentum switch,” he said. “It was in the high red zone where we wanted to draw up something. We worked on it all week and we felt very confident about it. A great swing of events for us to get that play call and execute it.”

Jags are making turnovers costly

Lawrence said scoring off turnovers (17 points against the Colts) gets contagious and also is a more important statistic than total yards or third-down conversions. The Jaguars were outgained 354-233 and had another poor game in third-down conversions, making only 4 of 14 (28.6 percent).

“We were good in the first half ... second half didn’t move the ball much, didn’t have a ton of yards,” Lawrence said. “You look at turnover margin, points off turnovers … that’s huge. We’re playing really complementary. That’s what good teams do. You take advantage when the other team makes mistakes and you limit your mistakes.”

The Jaguars have forced 15 turnovers (an NFL high prior to the conclusion of the afternoon Sunday night and Monday games) and given up eight this season. The offense has scored five touchdowns and two field goals after getting turnovers, for 41 points in all, while opponents have converted turnovers into only 13 points.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Travis Etienne scores twice around Josh Allen's strip-sack to spark Jags