Chiefs' Patrick Mahomes makes NFL history against the Chargers

The Kansas City Chiefs' star QB has found a rich vein of form recently and with it a little piece of NFL history

Patrick Mahomes makes NFL history

With 10 minutes left to play in the fourth quarter of Kansas City's game against the Chargers on Thursday night, things weren't going according to plan for Patrick Mahomes. Having just thrown an interception, the quarterback had basically gifted a touchdown to Los Angeles allowing them to take the lead at 21-13. Yet, it seems that play only served as a catalyst for what would become a stunning late game performance by the player they call the 'half billion dollar man." During the next nine minutes and 30 seconds of the fourth quarter and into over time, Mahomes would go on complete 10 of 13 passes for 197 yards and three touchdowns in what would eventually be a 34-28 win over the Chargers. In doing so Mahomes also claimed a little piece of NFL history for himself.

How did he do that? In throwing those three touchdown passes, Mahomes actually put his name in the NFL record book by becoming only the fourth quarterback in NFL history to throw three game-tying or lead-changing touchdowns in the fourth quarter or later of a game, according to ESPN Stats and Info. The other three on that list are:

How significant is Mahomes' feat?

To put into perspective what Mahomes achieved on Thursday night, one can think of it like this: Firstly a team's defense would have to fail terribly in the fourth quarter. Then, said team's quarterback would have to answer and surpass each of the scores made by the opposing team. That is exactly what Mahomes did against the Chargers. His first touch down was a game tying one-yard pass to Tyreek Hill. The Chargers, who were clearly in the mood, answered with their very own touchdown. It was then over to Mahomes, who clearly  had not read their script as he drove directly down field and once again delivered a TD pass to Travis Kelce, this time tying the game at 28. At that point it was into overtime, where Mahomes put the game to bed with a 34 yard walk-off touchdown pass to Kelce, giving Kansas City the win. In total Mahomes threw a season-high 410 yards.

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Mahomes in line for another record?

With this most recent win, Mahomes is now 12-0 in his career in divisional road games. What's that mean? Firstly, that's the longest streak to start a career ever, but it's also ties him with Peyton Manning for the second-longest overall streak in NFL history. Manning for his part won 12 straight divisional road games from 2010 to 2015 (Manning won one with the Colts in 2010 and then nine straight once he joined the Broncos).

If he is to break the record, Mahomes will have to win a minimum of nine more games. There is the small matter of the legendary Joe Montana who once won 20 consecutive divisional road games from 1984 to 1993. Montana's streak started with the 49ers and then continued into then continued into his first season with the Chiefs in 1993 before finally coming to an end in his first game on the road in 1994 against - ironically enough - the Chargers.