Chiefs’ Schottenheimer at a Loss to Figure Out This One : AFC West: Raiders put a convincing end to Kansas City streak.

Kansas City Coach Marty Schottenheimer could not explain why the Chiefs played so badly in their 28-7 loss to the Raiders at the Coliseum.

After defeating the Raiders six consecutive times and entering Sunday’s game with a four-game winning streak, Schottenheimer’s team was dominated.

“I wouldn’t say that we were flat,” he said. “But I don’t have any idea why we couldn’t make the plays.”

From the opening kickoff, Kansas City’s spell on the Raiders seemed to be over. While the Raiders scored a season-high 28 points, the Chiefs had problems blocking, catching, punting and tackling.

“It was like Christmas out there,” said Anthony Smith, Raider defensive lineman. “Santa Claus came down on all 47 of them and sent them back to Kansas City.”

The Chiefs dug an early hole for themselves. After not being able to move the ball to begin the game, Kansas City gave up good field position and was down, 7-0, after a 10-play, 57-yard drive by the Raiders.

To make matters worse, the Chiefs were shut down again on their next possession and then saw the Raiders’ Elvis Patterson block Bryan Barker’s punt and recover it for a touchdown.

“The punt block was a key; it came out of nowhere,” Chief running back Barry Word said. “After that, we were playing catch-up.”

On the blocked punt, Barker was sidelined because of an injured shoulder. That made kicker Nick Lowery the team’s punter and cost the Chiefs’ field position the rest of the game.

With their offense still unable to generate any yards, the Raiders capitalized on a short Lowery punt and scored on a seven-play, 35-yard drive to take a 21-0 lead with 8:42 left in the second quarter.

Trailing by three touchdowns, the Chiefs had to go exclusively to a shotgun offense, and it helped give them their only spark of the game.

Kansas City mounted an 88-yard, pass-dominated scoring drive shortly before halftime that was capped by a two-yard pass from Dave Krieg to Keith Cash.

With a little momentum on their side to start the second half, the Chiefs drove to the Raiders’ six-yard line to start the third quarter. Then came their biggest mistake.

With a hard rush in his face, Krieg threw an interception to the Raiders’ Dan Land in the end zone.

“I just did not get the ball in front of (wide receiver J.J. Birden),” Krieg said. “I felt a little pressure, and I saw him a little late.”

It was downhill from there for the Chiefs.

With the loss, Kansas City dropped to 8-5, tied with San Diego in the AFC West.

“Listen, we have three games left and if we win them all, I’ll take our chances,” Schottenheimer said. “We hold the key to our destiny.”

That may be true for the Chiefs, but they will have to get healthy first and re-establish their lost running game.

With two starting offensive linemen sidelined because of injuries, Kansas City gained 17 yards in 14 carries. Word, who gained 125 yards in the Chiefs’ last game against the Raiders, was held to four yards in four carries.

“They stopped our run,” Word said, “but we really haven’t been able to run the ball against any team for a while now.”

After terrorizing the league last season with its trio of running backs (Word, Christian Okoye and Harvey Williams), Kansas City entered Sunday’s game with the league’s 13th-best rushing average, 110 yards.

“I know that we have to run the football in order for us to win football games,” Word said. “I don’t think that we’ve ever been able to go into our shotgun and score a lot of points to beat teams.”

Against the Raiders, Kansas City shuffled its offensive line with Joe Valerio, who normally is a backup tackle, having to play center and Tom Dohring and Joe Staysniak filling in at tackle.

“They lined up like we knew they would, but we just couldn’t block them,” Valerio said. “I don’t think our movement with the linemen was the problem.”

Word disagreed.

“It was like we were confused out there at times,” he said. “And when bad things start to happen, the worst thing you could do is to lose the trust of the guy playing next to you.

“Somehow, we have to get things going again.”