Chargers End Titans' Playoff Charge

For the Tennessee Titans, the mission was pretty simple. They needed to win their final two games and get help to make the playoffs.

It wasn't meant to be. An 0-6 start proved too deep a hole, as did a buzzsaw of an opponent Friday night at LP Field in Nashville. The San Diego Chargers (12-3) cruised past Tennessee (7-8), 42-17, to clinch a first-round bye in the AFC playoffs. It marks San Diego's 10th straight win, while the Titans are officially eliminated from playoff contention in the AFC.

The night started with some promise for Tennessee. They got a stop on the Chargers' opening drive, allowing Vince Young to lead his team into range for a Rod Bironas field goal to open the scoring.

Unfortunately for Tennessee, the only time the Philip Rivers-led Chargers would fail to score after that was when Rivers took a knee in the final seconds of the first half. San Diego scored touchdowns on three straight possessions to take a 21-3 lead, added touchdowns on their first three possessions of the second half to go up 42-10, then promptly allowed Rivers to spend the rest of his night on the sideline.

LaDainian Tomlinson had two short touchdown runs. Darren Sproles ran for two second-half scores and also caught a touchdown pass. Rivers was 21 of 27 for 264 yards and two touchdowns. The win moves him to 18-0 all-time in December starts, and it may add some more juice to his darkhorse MVP candidacy.

Yes, other quarterbacks are getting more publicity, but Rivers has been at his very best this season, and while he might not have a prayer of winning the award, it's sad that his performance this season has been largely ignored.

Not much went right for Tennessee, outside of another superb night for running back Chris Johnson. The Titans' star ran for 142 yards and a touchdown, leaving him 128 yards short of the magical 2,000-yard mark for the season. It's more than attainable, since the Titans close out the season next Sunday at Seattle.

Young was generally awful on this night, hitting just eight of his 21 throws for under 100 yards. He threw two bad interceptions and had a costly first-half fumble that came after a nice scramble for a first down. All three Young turnovers led to Charger touchdowns.

Any chance Young and the Titans had to get back in the game went away quickly in the second half. After a Young quarterback draw got Tennessee in the end zone before halftime, they got the ball to start the third quarter. A San Diego penalty put the ball at the Titans' 38 to start out. Three plays later, Tennessee faced a fourth-and-one at their 47. Instead of taking a shot with the league's best running back, coach Jeff Fisher sent out the punt team.

Four plays later, San Diego reached the point on the field -- the Tennessee 47 -- that they would have started at should the Titans have failed on a potential fourth-down play. Four plays after that, Tomlinson scored to give the Chargers a 28-10 lead. The rout was on, in part because of the Titans' inability to seize a nice opportunity to start the second half.

Give Fisher credit. He was able to get the ship righted in Nashville after a disastrous start. In the end, however, 0-6 was way too much for a flawed team to overcome. The fact that they have a reasonable chance to salvage a .500 season and get their star over 2,000 rushing yards will have to do for now.