Miami Dolphins fans have high expectations of seeing their favorite team become divisional champions, but the focus of Tua Tagovailoa & Co. appears to be directly on the Super Bowl this season. The Dolphins improved their record to 3-0 after three games, setting a franchise record.
They may add another win to their tally after their most recent game, in which they dashed the Denver Broncos’ Super Bowl hopes. However, the team reportedly skipped celebrating, and the starter and coach of the team explained why after the game.
Tua Tagovailoa explains the decision to keep NFL history unscathed
The Dolphins defeated the Broncos handily in their third game of the year, scoring 70 points in the process. Tagovailoa’s team had a chance to set the NFL’s single-game scoring record with a 50-point advantage in the contest. The NFL record for the most points scored in a single game during the Super Bowl era is held by the Chicago Bears, who achieved a 73-0 victory over Washington.
They could have broken this record with 73 points if they had made just one more field goal. Despite being on the verge of breaking the record, Tua Tagovailoa and his coach, Mike McDaniel, decided against it. When McDaniel was questioned after the game about their choice to forego breaking the 83-year record, the coach responded that their goal for the game was to win, not to chase the record.
“It felt like chasing points and chasing a record, that’s not what we came to the game to do, that doesn’t have a bearing not the overall season outcome. 10 times out of 10 you concede and kneel down in those situations.”
The Broncos’ humiliating defeat against the Dolphins will likely haunt them throughout this entire season. In a post-game interview, Tagovailoa also expressed solidarity with his team’s coach and emphasized that their intention was not to humiliate the Broncos by breaking the record.
“We’re not going out there to humiliate teams. That’s just what it happened to look like.”
While the night was nearly record-breaking for the Dolphins, the Broncos’ situation was quite the opposite. Although Denver’s coach, Sean Payton, initially blamed Nathaniel Hackett for not harnessing the superpower of their Pro quarterback Russell Wilson on the field, after just three games, Payton found himself less successful than Hackett.
Dolphins QB’s season by numbers
The Dolphins’ star player Tua Tagovailoa started his NFL journey under the wings of the Dolphins and within just three seasons, the quarterback placed himself as a unanimous hero of the team’s quarterback room. In just three games of the season, the signal-caller amassed 1,024 rushing yards, 8 touchdowns, and 2 interceptions. Fans can observe his gradual skill improvement by comparing these records with those from his rookie season, where he accumulated 1,814 yards, 11 touchdowns, and 5 interceptions in 10 games during his debut season.
The Dolphins allowed Tua Tagovailoa to play as the starter following his debut season as a backup because they realized that he had already resolved all of their quarterback room’s issues. In that season, he recorded 2,653 yards, 16 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions in 13 games, meeting their expectations. However, in his final season with the Dolphins, the accomplished athlete surpassed all of his previous records, playing 13 games and amassing 3,548 yards, 25 touchdowns, and 8 interceptions.
Tua Tagovailoa’s exceptional quarterback ability has been one of the key contributors to the team’s winning streak. Hence, Tyreek Hill feels unmotivated to accept significant credit for the Dolphins’ nearly record-setting game after an NFL analyst gushed about him in a Twitter post and mentioned his quarterback as the main reason for the winning streak.
