Jaguars 31, Chargers 30
TREVOR LAWRENCE: (Referring to t-shirt) I've had these made for a couple weeks but it felt like the right day.
Q. Four first-half interceptions, probably the worst half of football you've played maybe in your football life so far, but you managed to bounce back, lead the team to victory. How were you able to do that? What did Coach tell you and what did you tell yourself?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: I mean, I said it after the game. Kind of just sums up our season, the game tonight.
For myself, obviously yeah, definitely the worst half of my football life, of a lot of people's football life, too. Some type of history probably in that stat.
Really I felt like only one of those plays was a big decision. I felt like I was seeing things all right. A couple -- they made a couple great plays. There was one where Zay got tangled up for whatever -- we'll leave it at that. The guy made a good play, though, on the 4th down early in the game, and then the one when we were backed up was a bad decision.
I felt like I was seeing it all right and I just needed to settle in. We couldn't get any momentum going, couldn't get a drive going. Really just felt like we needed to settle in, and then our defense kept getting stops for us, and I knew once we get the ball and get rolling for that first score like we did at the end of the half, once we kind of got that and got the momentum back, felt good about -- we've been in that situation before, not that many points but similar situations.
That's the thing, just the belief in this team. It's kind of -- it's really cool to see what can happen when everybody believes.
I wouldn't have been able to do what I did today and what the offense was able to do in the second half to bounce back. Also the defense, if we didn't believe in one another. I threw four picks in the first half, and those guys beside me on offense and the guys on the other side of the ball didn't ever lose faith in me, and that's one thing that makes it easier, when you know you've got guys that believe in you, no matter what the circumstances are.
Q. Doug's play call on that 4th and 1, the handoff to Travis, him calling time-out right before to get you guys settled down, can you talk about the confidence you guys had when you were lined up for that and the confidence in Doug and his play call?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: Yeah, we actually had a different call on before, and he didn't like the look that the defense was in. It was probably smart looking back at it. Just got the time-out off. I was kind of mad at first because I thought it was going to work. Then he told me, and I was like, all right, sounds good. So then he got the new call in, and just get the ball in Travis's hands, and he makes a play like that, wins the game for us essentially. Obviously Riley won the game, but putting us in position there. It takes a lot of guts there, 4th and 1 and game on the line, and just the guys up front, they just mashed them. They set the edge, and Travis was rolling.
Q. Some close losses early in the season for the Jags, but where did the belief to battle out of a deficit like that one come from?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: I think we've always had it, and we just weren't on the right side of them for a few weeks, but I really think we never stopped believing. That was the main thing. We had five losses, those five losses in a row all one-score games, had opportunities to win it, and even after that fifth one, it's like, we never wavered, never lost belief. Coach didn't lose belief in us. That's how we dug our way out of it, and same thing we did tonight.
That's why I said it kind of epitomizes our season. You're never out of it, and I think that's the one lesson that we've all learned. I know I've learned this year is just, like I said, when you believe and everybody believes, it's cool what you can accomplish, and tonight was one of those games.
Q. How do you top what you guys just did tonight and what you did tonight?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: Hopefully we don't have to. Hopefully we play a little bit better next week. The defense, hopefully they play just like they did tonight. They did a great job. But offensively you can't turn the ball over that many times and expect to win. We found a way tonight, but it's probably not a good formula moving forward.
I know for me just personally, it shouldn't take that type of second half to go win the game. If you just play better in the first half and take care of the ball. I didn't play my best tonight, so I'm going to watch the tape -- there's going to be so much to learn from, but honestly, you couldn't write a better script than to win a game like that tonight.
Makes it more special, but don't want to do that again.
We've got to take care of the ball. That's where it starts. I think besides that, it was a pretty -- all phases played pretty well besides just the turnovers on offense.
I think we can be -- I know we can be better on 3rd down. We weren't great tonight. That's another area to improve on, but took advantage of our red zone opportunities, scored on most of those or all of those.
Yeah, just hang on to the ball.
Q. Your receivers said that as the interceptions and turnovers were piling up that you kept the huddle level, kept a level mindset. How do you do that inside your own head? How do you keep your head level?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: Yeah, like I said, I didn't really -- honestly didn't have a choice. We've come this far, and those guys are depending on me. To win games in general in this league but especially in the playoffs, the quarterback has to play well. Wasn't playing well, and I knew it was going to take a lot to turn it around, but there's no -- I told the guys in the huddle, there's no 27-point plays. It's going to be one play at a time. That's what it took, one play at a time, all the way down the field, just to get in the game again.
All we can do at this point is just try to score every drive, then trust our defense. If they get a stop, great; if gives us another chance to score. If they don't, great; we'll get the ball back and go score again. So that was our mindset, and you've got playing with confidence.
That was the one thing, just self-talk in my head going back and forth. It's tough when you're struggling and not playing well, but if I don't continue to be myself, we don't have a shot to win because then I'm going to miss the plays that I usually make.
I just had to keep my confidence. Missed a few throws, I think where some of those turnovers where I was being a little cautious. After that I felt like I kind of got back on track and settled in.
Q. Just to piggy-back on that a little bit, is that a learned thing, to be able to overcome that kind of failure? Could you do that back in high school or college? I know you didn't have this kind of failure in high school or college, but would you have been able to have that second half last year even?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: It's kind of hard to say. Probably not. Like I said, just really it's -- I was able to turn it around and play well in the second half, but it all stems from the collective belief of the team.
When you get in that situation and you don't -- and you feel like everyone doesn't really believe you've got a shot and things start to crumble around you, whether that's defense, offense, that's kind of when you're in trouble and it doesn't feel like you've got a shot to win it, and there was never that feeling.
Even at halftime, I think it was 27-7, down 20, and Foley brought everybody up, and he's like, we're going to win this game. We're going to find a way to win this game; you've got to believe it. And we all believed it. We really did.
That's the crazy thing is it's easy to say it after, but you really don't -- if you don't really believe it.
Man, I don't really know what else to say. I'm kind of rambling because it's just a special night. I'm just proud of the group, this city. It was a special night for a lot of people, and just thankful for everybody that played a part in it.
Q. Why do you think this team seems to thrive on doing things sort of the hard way? Like coming back from 3-7 to win the division, and then something like this?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: I don't know, Coach showed a video -- I don't know if you guys heard of Jocko. You guys can look it up. It's this video where he talks about "good." And it's like, no matter what happens, that's your response: "Good." Threw four picks in the first half, good. He showed that back in -- I don't know if it was training camp or during the season maybe when we were on that losing streak. I don't know when it was.
But that's just been our mindset. Then we say it on the sideline joking around. One of the linemen, I forget who it was, said to me after I threw three or four picks, he was like, "good," just looking at me, like all right, not the time. But it's just the mindset of this group.
Like I said, you can't make a living on doing it the hard way all the time, but you're going to have to sometimes, and we had to tonight, and we were able to get it done.
Q. You've played in a lot of big games in your life. This is your first career playoff game. Where does this one stack up for you with the games that you've played in?
TREVOR LAWRENCE: It's up there. It's a special one. Definitely one I'll never forget. First playoff win. Like we talked about, obviously, the ups and downs of the game. I mean, it kind of speaks for itself.
It's special, and there's something about this team, just the way we've been able to stick together, it's really honestly kind of leaves you speechless sometimes. I've said it a million times, but just the belief, it's really cool. I'm proud to be a part of it. It's just the beginning for us.
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FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports