The Jacksonville Jaguars’ Resurrection: From Doormat to Favorites with Trevor Lawrence

From doormat to favorite The Jaguars’ amazing resurrection

By Heiko Oldörp October 29, 2023, 8:40 a.m

Although they are at home in the Sunshine State, the Jacksonville Jaguars were considered the NFL’s gray mouse for many years. No stars, no success, hardly any spectators. But now there is an exciting and successful team around young quarterback Trevor Lawrence.

They still talk about it in Jacksonville sometimes. Yes, still. Although almost six years have passed since January 21, 2018. That Sunday, the Jacksonville Jaguars played the New England Patriots in the AFC Championship. And they played brilliantly, leading 20:17 with 2:48 minutes left. For the first time in the club’s history, the Super Bowl was within reach – for them, the Jaguars. A franchise that is considered the epitome of a gray mouse. Which you can forget when listing the 32 NFL clubs – similar to FC Augsburg in the Bundesliga. But then Tom Brady came along – and the Jaguars still lost 20:24.

The fact that they are currently talking more often about that season, that team and that game in Jacksonville is because the current defense is sometimes reminiscent of the outstanding defense from back then. But now – and that’s the big difference – they finally have a really good quarterback in Trevor Lawrence. And he directs an offense that has several sources of danger with wide receivers Calvin Ridley and Christian Kirk, running back Travis Etienne (already seven touchdowns) and tight end Evan Engram. The result: seven games, five wins. The Jaguars are at the top of the AFC South – whose doormat they have been for many years – and they play today as favorites against the Pittsburgh Steelers (6 p.m. / RTL +), who also have a record of 4-2 victories.

Coach Pederson is even talking about winning the championship

Doug Pederson was asked this week whether he expected this kind of start to the season. “Yes,” the coach replied and added a “honestly” at the end. Pederson, unlike the Jaguars, reached the Super Bowl in 2018. With the Philadelphia Eagles. And he even won it, 41:33 against the Patriots. He has been a coach in Jacksonville for a year and a half now. Pederson took over a completely unsettled team – and shaped it into a sure playoff candidate.

It’s an amazing metamorphosis they’ve undergone in northeast Florida. But the process is not yet complete. “We not only want to be a team that is considered a championship contender, but we want to be the team that becomes a champion,” emphasizes Pederson. Such brash, cheeky, self-confident sounds have never come from Jacksonville before. And such announcements were unthinkable twelve months ago. After eight games the balance was 2:6, after ten games it was 3:7. Nothing, absolutely nothing, indicated that these Jacksonville Jaguars would still make the playoffs. But then they won six of the last seven meetings of the regular season. And how.

Defense sets league record

Trevor Lawrence is the conductor of the dangerous offensive.

(Photo: AP)

The team understood Doug Pedersen’s preferred offensive game idea from the end of November and implemented it more and more. And the Jaguars had become the comeback kings. 17 points behind against the Dallas Cowboys, ten points behind against the Tennessee Titans, nine against the Baltimore Ravens – and yet all games were still won. And then came the wild card game against the LA Chargers. A game for the NFL history books. Jacksonville was 0:27 behind – but still won 31:30. It was the third-largest comeback in NFL playoff history.

They carried this momentum into the new season – not only offensively, but also defensively. The defense has already taken the football from the opponent 16 times in the seven games so far – a league record. Eleven of these takeaways have come in the last four games, all of which have been won. Those takeaways, i.e. capturing footballs – either tearing them out of the opponent’s hands or intercepting passes from the quarterback – are a credit to Bob Sutton. The 72-year-old is part of the defensive coaching staff. And he never misses an opportunity to remind his players of the Jaguars defensive mantra every day. “Takeaways” is what he says in his text message to the players in the morning. And “Takeaways” is also the last word the professionals hear from him before they go onto the training pitch. “He’ll probably be in my head for the rest of my life,” outside linebacker Josh Allen said with a smile.

“Matured team”

Including the five games won at the end of the last round of points, Jacksonville has stolen the football 27 times. In twelve games. This was only achieved nine times in the entire 2021 season. In the 37:20 win against the Indianapolis Colts on October 15th, the thieving defense contributed 17 points to the success. “This is huge, the numbers say it all,” says Pederson happily. Lawrence, who is just 24 years old, describes the Jaguars as a “mature team.” He was already considered a quarterback prodigy in eighth grade and was considered a potential No. 1 draft pick when he arrived at Clemson in 2018. In 2021 he actually came to Jacksonville like that.

And who knows where he – and therefore the Jaguars – would be today if it hadn’t been for the unspeakable 2021 season under coach Urban Meyer. He was a successful college coach and had, among other things, won the national championship three times. Many had therefore seen him as the perfect mentor for Lawrence. But Meyer’s first foray into the NFL was only an interlude. His style of coaching didn’t work with the professionals. There were even allegations that he had kicked the club’s kicker. In addition, the sporting record was 2:11, so owner Shahid Khan fired him.

Pederson followed Meyer – and with him came consistency, success and a lot of self-confidence. “As good as last season was for us, we can still do so much more,” emphasizes Lawrence. The 24-year-old says that he and his teammates got a taste for it through the victories, the comeback successes and the courageous performance in the 20:27 defeat in the playoffs quarter-finals against eventual champions Kansas City. “You suddenly say to yourself, ‘We can compete, we can even beat these teams,'” Lawrence said in preseason.

Great competition from Florida Gators

The Jacksonville Jaguars have been around since 1995. Although the metropolis has no NBA team, no NHL franchise or even a team in the MLB, only the Jaguars alongside the TPC Sawgrass, one of the most famous golf courses in the world, these were irrelevant for many years – and only 30 The beaches in Neptune Beach, Atlantic Beach, Jacksonville Beach or Ponte Vedra Beach, which are only a few minutes’ drive away, are often far more interesting to many than the football team. This was due to the lack of sporting success, but above all because the greater Jacksonville area has always been Gators Country. The University of Florida football team is the most popular team in the region. They have been around since 1906 – 89 years longer than the Jaguars. And they were in the prestigious college final four times between 1995 and 2008 – and won it three times.

But these Jaguars around Trevor Lawrence have the chance to shake up the balance of power in North Florida. The team is young, interesting, exciting – and it is successful. Lawrence is only 24 years old, but he is already the leader. He moves forward, he carries others along with him. It always sounds a bit cliché when it is said that a player is the first to enter the training ground in the morning and the last to leave in the evening – but with Lawrence it is actually the case. “Trevor wants to be a great quarterback. And he doesn’t think he’s done that yet. That’s what motivates players like him,” Pederson said.

This William Trevor Lawrence is not only the present of the Jacksonville Jaguars, but also the future. And he could possibly ensure that a narrowly lost AFC Championship Game in January 2018 will soon no longer be the highlight of the club’s history, but that people in Jacksonville will finally talk about the Super Bowl.

2023-10-29 07:40:00


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