Falcons Collapse After Missed Chances, Costly Mistakes Doom Atlanta vs. 49ers

SANTA CLARA, CA – Six days after the Atlanta Falcons put together their most complete team win of the season, it all seemed to unravel against San Francisco. In front of a national audience on Sunday Night Football, it all fell apart against the 49ers in a 20-10 loss that was filled with mistakes and missed chances. 

“We had a lot of opportunities to win this game,” quarterback Michael Penix Jr. said afterwards. “Unfortunately, we didn’t capitalize on the big moments, especially that big fourth down late in the game. There were a lot of little things we missed on offense that ended up making a big difference. The defense gave us opportunities to get the lead, and we just didn’t capitalize when we needed to.”

Despite facing a banged-up 49ers defense, Atlanta’s offense sputtered from start to finish. They finished with a season low in total yards (292) and rushing yards (62), a sharp drop from the unit’s two best performances the previous weeks.

Mistakes plagued the Falcons on Sunday in the critical moments, both on offense and defense. The most glaring of these came with time winding down before halftime. 

The offense, who had struggled with clean play for much of the first half, had finally found a groove. Penix connected with wide receiver Darnell Mooney down the sideline. Instead of stepping out of bounds to preserve time, Mooney cut back inside to fight for a few more yards. He picked up a few, but the Falcons were forced to burn their last timeout in the process. 

The mistake was magnified on their next play from scrimmage. From the San Francisco 22-yard line, Penix dropped back to pass. The 49er pass rush got to him, and looking to avoid a critical sack, he threw the ball away. 

The only problem there was that he was still inside the tackle box. The Falcons were flagged for intentional grounding, and the resulting 10-second runoff pushed them into the locker room without an opportunity to attempt a chip shot field goal. 

This devestating mistake came back to haunt the Falcons in the second half. Defensively, they had done well to hold San Francisco out of the end zone. Atlanta trailed by just three points for much of the second-half. Had they been tied late in the game, perhaps the Falcons would have opted to take a lead instead of going for it on 4th-and-1. 

They failed on that conversion due to the defender knowing what was coming, and the subsquent drive iced the game – but not before another brutal mistake by the Falcons. 

With 2:46 left in the game, and the Falcons still with all three of their timeouts, the 49ers had driven the ball up to the edge of the red zone. Facing a 3rd-and-11, with the game on the line trailing just three points, the Falcons gave up a 17-yard completion to a wide open Christian McCaffrey. 

As it turns out, on one of the most critical moments in the game, the Falcons had just 10 men on the field. A back-breaking mistake.