Raiders Make Use of the Run-and-Run Against Dolphins

Nicknamed the Miami Pound Machine, the Miami Dolphins had the NFL’s stingiest defense coming into Monday night’s game against the Raiders. The Dolphins hadn’t allowed a touchdown on the ground in 24 consecutive quarters.

But the streak ended as the Raiders pounded the Miami Pound Machine, amassing 177 yardson the ground in a 13-10 victory.

After running for a total of only 149 yards in their last two games, the Raiders returned to basics by staying on the ground.

Bo Jackson, who had rushed for 118 yards in his first three games, had his best game of the season, gaining 99 yards in 17 carries. After averaging only 3.7 yards per carry in his first three games, Jackson averaged 5.8 yards per carry against the Dolphins.

“Art (Shell) challenged us this week in practice,” Jackson said. “He had a few choice words to say to us about the way we’d played the past two games. And we sat down and decided to play old Raider football, and we went out and did just that.

“I think they were surprised that we ran that much, but with Steve Smith, Marcus Allen and myself it’s hard to key on one person. We showed them that they could be run on and we did it the old- fashioned way.”

Jackson almost scored a touchdown, bursting around the corner for a 26-yard gain, his longest run of the season, before he was collared by safety Jarvis Williams, who dragged Jackson to the ground out of bounds by grabbing his facemask. Jackson responded by shoving Williams.

“I was upset,” Jackson said. “You just don’t do that, period.”

Allen rushed for 79 yards in 19 carries, a 4.2 average, and scored one touchdown. Allen’s two-yard touchdown run, which capped an 18-play, 79-yard drive, was the first rushing touchdown the Dolphins had allowed in almost two months.

The Raiders’ run-and-run strategy was simple but effective.

Although the Dolphins had allowed an average of only 72.7 yards rushing per game, the Raiders had amassed 104 yards on the ground by halftime as they jumped out to a 10-7 lead.

“Our running game has been a little bit to be desired in previous weeks, and we just took it upon ourselves as a challenge to prove to the nation on Monday night football that we do have a good team,” Raider guard Max Montoya said.

The Raiders made a statement at the start of the game as Allen and Jackson ran 10 consecutive times for 46 yards on the first two series before quarterback Jay Schroeder attempted a pass.

After the Raiders took over at their own 48 on the first series of the game, Allen picked up 20 yards on the first play of the game. Allen gained six yards on his next carry, followed by runs of three, five, four and five yards. But on third and one at the Dolphin 10, Allen was stopped for no gain when he was hit by defensive end Jeff Cross.

Disdaining a field goal on fourth and one, the Raiders went for the first down. But with the play clock running down, the Raiders rushed instead of calling time out and Allen was stopped at the line of scrimmage by free safety Louis Oliver.

Although the Raiders came away without scoring any points, they had made a psychological point that they could run the ball against Miami.

“We wanted to challenge ourselves as well as challenge the Dolphins and that’s what we did,” Allen said. “We know we have the personnel to go out and do the job and we did pretty well tonight.”

The Raiders ran the ball on the first two plays of their next series as Allen gained six yards on first down before Jackson replaced him. Jackson picked up a yard before Schroeder threw the Raiders’ first pass of the game.

Shell, who made no secret that the Raiders planned to run against the Dolphins, challenged his offensive line to block the Dolphins so that the Raiders could run.

“We’d been working hard running the ball the last two weeks, but it just didn’t click,” said guard Steve Wisniewski. “We just went back to basics and just played physical Raider football and it worked.”

Schroeder credited the offensive line, which didn’t allow a sack, for helping the Raiders establish the run.

“We wanted to show everyone that we could run the football, and we were just going to give it to Marcus and Bo and let them run,” Schroeder said. “We knew that our offensive line was going to have to play well. We were going to let them come off the ball and try to play smash-mouth football and we did a great job doing it.”

Were the Dolphins surprised that the Raiders ran so much?

“We really didn’t play too terribly, but we played Art Shell’s way,” said cornerback Tim McKyer.