Ravens Team Headlines: Baltimore Defense Has Been Impressive Against The Run
By Daniel Benjamin
The Baltimore Ravens will take their No. 1 ranked defense up north to New England on Sunday night to try and ice Tom Brady and the Patriots' high-flying offense. The Ravens (7-5) will have a tough task, as the Patriots (10-2) enter the contest ranked sixth in scoring, sixth in total offense, fifth in passing offense and sixth in rushing offense. The Pats are 7-1 and averaging nearly 30 points per game since Brady returned from his four-game suspension.
Baltimore is the only team in the league that is holding teams under 300 total yards of offense. The Ravens are currently surrendering 296.1 yards of offense per game thanks, in large part, to a stout run defense that is limiting opponents to only 73.8 yards per game. The Ravens are also permitting a league-low 3.4 yards per carry. More impressively, their opponents are obtaining a first down on just 13.8 percent of their carries.
A big reason the Ravens have the top-ranked run defense is the play of defensive tackles Brandon Williams and Michael Pierce. Williams doesn't have huge stats, but he takes up a lot of space and is often double-teamed, thus freeing up linebackers Zach Orr and C.J. Mosley to make plays. Williams has 36 tackles to go along with one sack and one tackle for a loss on the season. He also has a blocked kick to his credit.
Pierce, an undrafted rookie out of Samford, has recorded 26 tackles. He also has three tackles for losses, one pass defensed and two sacks.
Baltimore has finished with the top-ranked run defense once in its history (2006).
The Ravens and Patriots have produced several memorable games
The Patriots and Ravens are meeting for just the 13th time in NFL history; however, this will be their 10th match-up since the beginning of the 2007 season. Four of the meetings have been in the playoffs, and six of the last nine games have been decided by less than a touchdown. The Patriots lead the all-time series 9-3.
The 2007 matchup is what kick-started a fierce rivalry that has spanned a decade. That year, New England entered the game with an unblemished 11-0 record while Baltimore came in at 4-7. The Ravens held a 24-17 early fourth quarter lead, and then led 24-20 with less than two minutes remaining. That is when the wackiness started.
Following an incomplete pass by Brady, the Patriots faced a fourth-and-one. The Ravens appeared to stuff the Patriots on a run play, but Baltimore called time out before the play. The Ravens recovered from that snafu and again stopped the Patriots, though the play was negated this time due to a false start penalty. On the next play, the Ravens were called for defensive holding to give the Patriots an automatic first down at the eight-yard line. Brady then hooked up with Jabar Gaffney with 44 ticks on the clock to give the Pats a 27-24 victory. Ravens linebacker Bart Scott picked up an unsportsmanlike penalty after the extra point for picking up an officials' penalty flag and firing it into the crowd.
The teams have split their four playoff games. They have also split their two AFC Championship games, though the Ravens went onto become Super Bowl XLVII Champions after they defeated the Patriots 28-13 in the AFC Championship game on January 20, 2013. The Patriots exacted some sort of revenge as they knocked out the Ravens 35-31 in the 2014 Wild Card game en route to their fourth Super Bowl crown.