ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) — When Sean Payton was preparing to hand over his offense to a rookie quarterback for the first time in his 17 years as an NFL head coach, he said two essential ingredients for success were a good ground game and a stout defense.
Both showed up in the Broncos' 33-10 smackdown of the injury-riddled Saints in Payton's emotional and triumphant return to New Orleans on Thursday night.
“I think they said 22 guys that were with the Saints at some point as coaches or players, so for Sean and all those guys it’s awesome,” defensive end Zach Allen said. “It’s definitely something we’re all going to remember for a long time.”
Vance Joseph's defense collected six sacks, two takeaways and a defensive touchdown (another was negated by penalty), and the Broncos (4-3) rushed for a whopping 225 yards. That included 75 yards by quarterback Bo Nix, who shook off an awful game against the Chargers last week to direct six consecutive scoring drives, two touchdown runs by Javonte Williams and four field goals by former Saints kicker Wil Lutz.
“We’ve got to turn some of those field goals into touchdowns,” Nix said, “but it was good to get points early and move the ball early. We got a first down on the first play, and our defense played solid as always, so we played well overall and ran the ball for a lot of yards. That helps all the time.”
Williams led the way with 88 yards on 14 carries and had his first career two-touchdown game.
“Everything clicked for me and everything clicked for the team on offense and defense," Williams said. "It was a great game for us.”
Four times the Broncos have held their opponent to one touchdown or less and three times they’ve allowed 10 or fewer points.
“When everyone does their job, we really can do special things, and we’ve been saying that since OTAs,” Allen said. “We have three of them this year and last year the sky was falling apparently, so we’re in a good spot. There’s still work to do, but we have the guys in here that will do the right things.”
Nix knows the offense has some leaps to make, too.
“We’re going to continue to find ways to have explosive plays and move the ball like we did today,” he said. “We just have to go back and duplicate it as the weeks go on.”
The defense has been top-notch all season and on Thursday night, the Broncos held the Saints out of the end zone on 11 drives before surrendering a late touchdown.
Despite the blowout, there's plenty of room for improvement on offense. Although the Broncos scored on six straight drives, four of them were field goals by former Saints kicker Wil Lutz.
ILB Cody Barton. He tied for the team lead with eight stops, had a sack, a quarterback hit, a forced fumble, a fumble recovery and a pass breakup. He scored a touchdown and had another score negated by a penalty. Barton has worn the green dot on his helmet so he can call the defensive signals ever since Alex Singleton went on season-ending IR a month ago.
WR Courtland Sutton, only because he had zero targets Thursday night. Williams had three catches, giving him 23 on the season, two more than Sutton, the Broncos' top receiver. Following a protracted spring holdout, Sutton agreed in July to a revision that includes an additional $1.5 million in performance-based incentives. Last month, the Broncos converted $11.875 million of his $13 million salary into a bonus.
Star CB Patrick Surtain II is expected to emerge from concussion protocol next week.
28 — sacks by the Broncos, which lead the league.
5 — consecutive games with at least one sack for Nik Bonitto.
4 — sacks by Zach Allen, one shy of last year's total in 17 games.
1 — game ball presented to Payton by team owner Greg Penner.
The Broncos host the Carolina Panthers on Oct. 27.
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