INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — The Los Angeles Rams’ frustration was palpable after they did too much to give away a possible win.
Wide receiver Davante Adams loudly swore to himself in the locker room, no regard for the assembled throng of reporters there to witness it. More expletives were audible from the press conference room next door. It was evident on head coach Sean McVay’s face as he ripped apart his own fourth-down play call that ended the game.
Simply put, the Rams felt they beat themselves against the San Francisco 49ers on Thursday night, ultimately falling 26-23 in overtime.
“For us to even be in it, you know, is a real credit to the resilience of the group,” McVay said. “But that’s not winning football tonight. There was a lot of really good plays at different points that kept us competitive, gives us a chance to go into overtime, but we certainly did more to lose that game that we did win it tonight.”
It is an all-too-familiar position for the Rams (3-2), who have shown a troubling knack for making things tough on themselves in the past 12 days. Numerous self-inflicted errors fueled a second-half meltdown against the defending champion Philadelphia Eagles. They responded last Sunday for a bounce-back win over Indianapolis, but needed to score two touchdowns in the final 3:20 while being helped out by the Colts’ own litany of gaffes.
The laundry list of mistakes against their Bay Area rivals in all three phases was enormous. The defense couldn’t stop a short-handed 49ers offense in the first half, allowing backup quarterback Mac Jones and a crew of reserve receivers to go up and down the field to build a 14-0 lead. When the offense finally awakened, running back Blake Corum lost a fumble deep in San Francisco territory.
Joshua Karty then missed a field goal in the third quarter and had an extra point blocked that would have given Los Angeles the lead early in the fourth quarter.
The secondary’s soft coverage allowed the 49ers to respond with a 59-yard field goal to go back up 23-20, before running back Kyren Williams fumbled on the 1 with a chance to put the Rams ahead.
The defense forced a three-and-out, allowing quarterback Matthew Stafford to drive the offense back down the field for Karty’s 48-yard field goal with two seconds remaining in regulation.
Following a 41-yard field goal by the Niners to start overtime, the Rams bypassed a chance to tie it up and instead handed the ball to Williams on fourth-and-short at the 11. He was stood up short of the line to gain, allowing the 49ers and their large contingent of red-clad fans to celebrate.
While McVay second-guessed himself about the decision not to extend the game, Stafford was fully onboard with the decision to go for it.
“I love we went for it,” Stafford said. “I mean, I’m not playing for a tie. Let’s go. Just wish we did, you know, kept the drive alive and found a way to score.”
Williams seemed more bothered by his earlier poor ball security, allowing rookie defensive lineman Alfred Collins to punch it loose inches from the goal line, than his inability to pick up the yard needed in the extra period.
“We wouldn’t even have got there if I just held onto the ball,” Williams said.
“We all, I guess, made mistakes, but I feel like mine was the one that let the team down,” he added later.
Linebacker Nate Landman is confident they will be able to regroup once again.
“I think we responded last time really well, the next game, so I know we’re capable of it now,” Landman said. “It’s just making sure we don’t have this feeling again, so I think we get back to work. We get couple days off here to learn from what we did wrong, take the lessons that we did well, and then move on to the Ravens.”
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