It’s Not Red-Letter Day for Chandler

Once in a blue moon, a team like the Atlanta Falcons stuns the NFL and advances to the Super Bowl.

And although the nighttime sky over Miami Sunday was illuminated by a blue moon--the second full moon in a calendar month--that promising omen was canceled out by the Falcons’ self-destructive tendencies in their 34-19 loss to the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXXIII at Pro Player Stadium.

Falcon quarterback Chris Chandler, whose red-zone rating of 109.6 was the NFL’s best this season, on Sunday saw the red zone as a red light. The Falcons got only two field goals on their first six ventures into the Broncos’ half of the field and didn’t score a touchdown until rookie Tim Dwight raced 94 yards on a kickoff return with 11:01 left in the game. The Atlanta offense didn’t produce a touchdown until Chandler completed a three-yard pass to Terance Mathis with 2:04 left.

“That’s the first time that ever happened to us this season,” Mathis said of the Falcons’ offensive struggles. “We just didn’t execute in the red zone.”

Said cornerback Ray Buchanan: “We were saying, ‘We used to score when we got to that area.’ If we had scored in all those situations when we got to the red area, it could have been different.”

Chandler, who this season quieted the critics who had condemned him as no better than average and not much good under duress, rated his performance as “fine” the first time he was asked. As he continued to reflect, he changed that to fair.

But even a three-interception game didn’t change his mind about his accomplishments and his team’s in what was an otherwise sterling season.

“I could sit here and try to explain a lot of things, but going through it again sounds like excuse-making,” he said. “To explain to you [reporters] is not important.

“It wasn’t a really lucky night for us tonight. Hopefully, we’ll do this again in our home stadium next year. Being satisfied this year, considering where we came from, that’s OK right now. But we can’t stop here.”

Interceptions stopped them Sunday on three second-half drives.

They trailed, 17-6, at the half and seemed to get a break when Jason Elam’s 38-yard field-goal attempt went wide right on the Broncos’ first possession. Chandler drove the Falcons to the Bronco 41, got sacked back to the 47, and then threw a pass intended for Mathis that was intercepted at the Bronco 30 by Darrius Johnson and returned to the Falcon 42.

Even then, the Falcons caught a break when Elam’s 48-yard field-goal attempt angled wide left. The Falcons moved to the Bronco 21 on a pair of gritty runs by Jamal Anderson and a 13-yard pass to Mathis, but Chandler’s pass intended for Tony Martin was tipped by Keith Traylor and intercepted by Darrien Gordon at the 18. Gordon returned the ball 58 yards to the Falcon 24; five plays later, on the opening play of the fourth quarter, Howard Griffith plunged one yard and Elam converted the extra point for a prohibitive 24-6 Denver lead.

“That would have been a huge play,” Chandler said. “I’d like to guess what would have happened if we didn’t have that ball tipped. We had a good chance of scoring a touchdown there. They did a real good job there. . . .

“They did a good job on some things and we were unlucky a few other times. They covered things fairly well in the red area, so their defense deserves some credit. without making any excuses, they did a good job.”

The Bronco defense came to the forefront again on the Falcons’ next possession. Chandler engineered a 44-yard drive to the Bronco 26, but Gordon stepped in front of Martin at the two-yard line and returned the ball to the Falcon 48. The Broncos capped that drive with their final touchdown.

“Chris read for Tony to come underneath, and they made the interception there,” Coach Dan Reeves said. “We just didn’t execute. We’ve got to give their defense credit. We missed opportunities that we can’t afford to miss.”

Said Mathis: “You’ve got to understand that Chris was under extreme pressure for most of the game when he was releasing the ball, and that’s going to cause problems. Chris came back this year from a lot of adversity, from people telling him how fragile he was and that he wasn’t a franchise quarterback, and he proved them wrong.”

Although he may have changed observers’ perception of him, that wasn’t much consolation Sunday. “I just feel awful. You lose the Super Bowl, you feel really awful,” he said. “I’m looking forward to going home and seeing my girls. I just feel bad and I want to move on.”