NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE

ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW ORLEANS — Wil Lutz kicked a 33-yard field goal as time expired, and the New Orleans Saints beat the Carolina Panthers 34-31 on Sunday to take a four-game lead in the NFC South with five games left.

Drew Brees completed 30 of 39 passes for 311 yards and three touchdowns, and led New Orleans from its own 14-yard line with 1:51 left to the Carolina 15-yard line with 3 seconds remaining to set up the winning kick, capping a con-test filled with late momentum shifts and critical errors — none bigger than Carolina kicker Joey Slye’s missed field goal from 28 yards with 2 minutes left.

New Orleans scored on the game’s opening possession and led until 9:23 remained in the fourth quarter, when D.J. Moore reached up with his right hand to corral a fourth-and-goal pass in the back of the end zone to tie it at 31.

Soon after, Panthers safety Eric Reid stuffed Alvin Kamara on a run to the right side on fourth-and-1 from the New Orleans 45, which set up a dramatic sequence as Carolina coach Ron Rivera suc-cessfully challenged the officials’ decision not to call pass interfer-ence on a third-down incomplete pass, setting up a first-and-goal at the 3 with 2:21 to go.

Carolina squandered its oppor-tunity, however, after Christian McCaffrey’s run was stuffed and Kyle Allen threw incomplete on second down and was sacked on third down by Marcus Davenport, setting up the end of a difficult day for Slye, who’d also missed two extra-point kicks.

Michael Thomas had 10 catches for 101 yards and a touchdown for New Orleans, including recep-tions of 14 and 24 yards on the game-winning drive.

SEAHAWKS 17, EAGLES 9: Rashaad Penny ran for a career-best 129 yards, including a 58-yard touch-down, Russell Wilson threw one touchdown pass and Seattle beat host Philadelphia. Missing their top three wide receivers, leading rusher and two Pro Bowl offensive linemen, the Eagles couldn’t do much on offense and hurt them-selves with three turnovers inside Seattle territory and another near midfield.

JETS 34, RAIDERS 3: Sam Darnold threw two touchdown passes and ran for another score, leading host New York to a victory over Oakland in East Rutherford, New

Jersey, for its first three-game winning streak in over two years. Brian Poole returned an intercep-tion 15 yards for a touchdown, and the rest of the Jets defense made things miserable for Derek Carr, who was pulled by coach Jon Gruden with just under two min-utes left in the third quarter.

BROWNS 41, DOLPHINS 24: Jarvis Landry caught two touchdown passes against his former team, and host Cleveland defeated Mi-ami for its third straight victory in the first game since losing star defensive end Myles Garrett to a season-ending suspension.

BUCCANEERS 35, FALCONS 22: Jameis Winston threw for three touchdowns, and Tampa Bay es-caped last place in the NFC South with a rout of host Atlanta. Win-ston shook off two more inter-ceptions to post his sixth straight 300-yard passing game, lead-ing the Buccaneers to just their second victory in the past seven games.

BILLS 20, BRONCOS 3: Josh Allen threw two touchdown passes, and Shaq Lawson had two of host Buffalo’s four sacks in a victory over the Denver in Orchard Park,

New York, that has the Bills off to their best start in 23 years. Allen finished 15 of 25 for 185 yards and threw his first interception in 172 attempts.

TITANS 42, JAGUARS 20: Host Tennessee scored four touch-downs over six offensive plays in the third quarter, routing Jack-sonville for its second straight victory to keep itself firmly in the AFC playoff hunt. Ryan Tannehill

ran for two touchdowns and threw two more to improve to 4-1 as the Titans’ starter. Derrick Henry ran for two touchdowns just 16 sec-onds apart, and rookie receiver A.J. Brown capped the scoring spurt with a 65-yard touchdown catch that made it 35-3.

REDSKINS 19, LIONS 16: Quinton Dunbar intercepted Jeff Driskel in the final minute, Dustin Hopkins hit the go-ahead field goal from

39 yards out with 16 seconds left and host Washington beat Detroit in Landover, Maryland, to snap a four-game losing streak.

BEARS 19, GIANTS 14: Khalil Mack set up a touchdown with a strip-sack, Allen Robinson had a sea-son-high 131 yards receiving and host Chicago beat struggling New York. Mitchell Trubisky threw for a season-high 278 yards, includ-ing a touchdown to Robinson.

STEELERS 16, BENGALS 10: Devlin Hodges took over for struggling Mason Rudolph and threw a 79-yard touchdown pass, spark-ing Pittsburgh to a victory that kept host Cincinnati the only winless team in the league.

PATRIOTS 13, COWBOYS 9: Tom Brady threw a touchdown pass and host New England’s defense held Dallas’ top-ranked offense without a touchdown for the first time this season. It was the Pa-triots’ 18th straight regular-sea-son victory at home. Dallas had a chance to take the lead late. But facing fourth-and-11 on its own 25 with 1:50 left, Dak Prescott’s 20-yard completion to Amari Cooper was nullified after an of-ficial review.

JOSH DUBOWAssociated Press

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Jimmy Garoppolo threw two long touch-down passes and the San Francisco harassed Aaron Rodgers all night, leading the 49ers to a 37-8 victory over the Green Bay Packers on Sunday.

Garoppolo connected on a 42-yard touchdown strike to Deebo Samuel in the second quarter and a 61-yarder to George Kittle in the third to get San Francisco off to a resounding start to a grueling three-game stretch.

Following the game against the first-place Packers, the Niners will travel to Baltimore and New Orle-ans the next two weeks in a stretch that will go a long way to deter-mining whether San Francisco will be able to hold off Seattle in a tight NFC West race.

Rodgers lost a fumble on the opening drive, one of the five sacks he took, and failed to convert a sin-gle third down on 13 tries before getting pulled late in the fourth quarter. He finished 20 of 33 for 104 yards, and Green Bay averaged an anemic 1.7 yards per pass play when he was in the game.

After allowing 78 points the past three weeks in two games against Arizona’s Kyler Murray and one against Seattle’s Russell Wilson, the Niners’ defense was back to its dominant form.

San Francisco allowed 198 yards on 70 plays, didn’t allow a single completion longer than 15 yards and got a key stop against Aaron Jones on a fourth-and-1 run in the first half.

Garoppolo then put it away with the two long touchdowns, part of a day when he went 14-for-20 for 253 yards and, most importantly, committed no turnovers.

He was helped by the return of Kittle, who had six catches for 129 yards in his first game back after missing the past two contests with injuries to his knee and ankle.

The 49ers broke it open late in the first half after forcing the Pack-ers to punt following the two-min-ute warning. Garoppolo threw the 42-yarder to Samuel to cap a

three-play drive that made it 20-0. The Niners then forced a three-and-out and took over at their 48 with 24 seconds left. Garoppolo completed a 22-yard pass to Kittle that set up Chase McLaughlin’s 48-yard field goal.

The Packers got into an early hole when Fred Warner sacked Rodgers on the opening drive,

forcing a fumble that Nick Bosa recovered at the 2. It was the first opening-drive turnover for Green Bay since the 2017 season finale when Brett Hundley threw an in-terception against Detroit. The most recent time it happened with Rodgers at quarterback came in the 2017 opener when he threw an in-terception against Seattle.

Tevin Coleman ran it in on the next play, marking the second time this season San Francisco scored on its first play. Matt Breida scored on an 83-yard run last month against Cleveland. The Niners were the first team since the 2013 Raiders to score twice on their first offensive play in a single season, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

49ers dominate, start gauntlet

Lutz kicks winning field goal, lifts SaintsSUNDAY’S GAMES

Seahawks receiver Josh Gordon cannot reach a pass against Eagles cornerback Jalen Mills during the second half Sunday in Philadelphia.

ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTOS

Panthers kicker Joey Slye, right, reacts after missing a field goal with two minutes left in the fourth quarter on Sunday in New Orleans.

BEN MARGOT, ASSOCIATED PRESS

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers is sacked by 49ers defensive tackle DeForest Buckner, center, and defensive end Arik Armstead, bottom, during the second half Sunday in Santa Clara, Calif.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 2019