Bengals, Trying to Clinch Division Title, Face Redskins : Williams, Green Out for Washington; Patriots Play at Denver in Today’s Other Game

The defending Super Bowl champion Washington Redskins are having a rough week.

First, they were eliminated from the playoffs by the lowly Dallas Cowboys, who had lost 10 games in a row before their 24-17 victory last Sunday on the Redskins’ home field.

Today in Cincinnati, the Redskins (7-8) will face the Bengals, a team that has some of the best offensive weapons in the National Football League.

The Bengals (11-4) can clinch their first American Football Conference Central Division title since 1981 by beating the Redskins. A capacity crowd is expected for the game at Riverfront Stadium, where the Bengals are 7-0 this year.

It gets worse for Washington.

Not only do the Bengals have the offense, the incentive and the home field, they have a healthier team. The Redskins lost defensive back Darrell Green to a broken hand, and quarterback Doug Williams bruised his right shoulder for the second consecutive week.

It’s not a pretty picture for Redskin Coach Joe Gibbs.

“I think it’s one of the toughest assignments we’ve had,” Gibbs said. “We’re going to play one of the best football teams--if not the best football team in the league--in a game they have to have at home. We’ve got a situation where we’re 7-8, it’s going to be our last game, we’re a beat-up football team.”

The Bengals proved last Sunday that they can be dominated. The Houston Oilers overpowered them, 41-6, in the Astrodome, Cincinnati’s most one-sided defeat in two years.

At Denver today, the New England Patriots will take on the Broncos, the other team in Super Bowl XXII, who are also out of the playoffs.

The Patriots are 9-6 and in second place in the AFC East. The Broncos are 7-8 and were eliminated from playoff contention last weekend when they lost to Seattle, 42-14.

Six games into the season, the Patriots, going nowhere with a 2-4 record and averaging a meager 89 yards per game on the ground, made a major philosophical change that transformed their season.

As rookie running back John Stephens remembers it, the Patriots’ offensive line asked for a meeting with Coach Raymond Berry to lobby for more emphasis on running the ball.

An old-fashioned ground assault, the argument went, might put a stop to the rash of interceptions (19) the New England quarterbacks had been throwing.

“The linemen told Coach Berry they felt they could block well enough for us to have a good running game,” Stephens said. “I’m glad Coach Berry was willing to try it.”

Embarrassed in a 45-3 loss to Green Bay in Week 6, the Patriots went out the next week and rushed for 158 yards to upset the previously unbeaten Bengals, 27-21. In the next five weeks, the Patriots never had fewer than 170 yards on the ground.

In the last nine games, New England has averaged 158.6 yards rushing--a fact that should be discomfiting to the Broncos’ embattled defense. Denver has the worst run defense in the NFL, yielding 158.2 yards per outing.

Since Reggie Dupard was slowed by a shoulder injury, the running burden fell to Stephens, a highly regarded No. 1 draft pick from Northwestern (La.) State. Stephens responded with four 100-yard games. With 1,038 yards on the season, he was named to the Pro Bowl and is considered a strong contender for rookie of the year.