Matt Gay's 53-yard field goal and a Chinn interception end the Raiders' losing streak, 38-33

The Raiders were outgained and generally outplayed for three quarters at MetLife Stadium, and they are 4-4 anyway. New York scored on its first six possessions and averaged 7.2 yards a play. Las Vegas averaged 5.6, ran for 2.9 a carry, and won 38-33 because it did the three things that decide close games. It finished drives, going 4-for-4 in the red zone against a Jets defense that let them. It did not turn the ball over. And it made the kick.

The turning point was the first snap of the fourth quarter. Las Vegas had the ball at its own 42, second and 11, trailing 30-28, on a drive that had started at its own 16 with 1:33 left in the third. Kirk Cousins threw to Ashton Jeanty on a shallow left-side route, and Jeanty turned it into 45 yards to the Jets 13 with Jamien Sherwood and Minkah Fitzpatrick arriving late. Six plays later, from the two, Cousins found Jalen Nailor for the touchdown that put the Raiders ahead 35-30 with 11:33 to go. That drive covered 84 yards in nine plays and took five minutes, and it was the third straight Raiders touchdown drive after halftime.

The game ended on a decision. Up 35-33 with the ball at the Jets 35, fourth and five, 31 seconds on the clock, Klint Kubiak called timeout and sent out Matt Gay. The 53-yarder was good with 27 seconds left, and the two-point lead became five, which meant Jason Sanders could no longer win the game for New York. Geno Smith got the Jets to the Las Vegas 35 anyway, helped by a 15-yard unnecessary roughness penalty on Jeremy Chinn, and then threw deep left for Garrett Wilson with Maxx Crosby in his face. Chinn caught it in the end zone with 14 seconds showing. Four straight losses, over.

Offense

The plan was clearly to live underneath and let the tight ends and backs work the middle of the field, and it worked about as well as it could against a front that was winning at the line of scrimmage. Cousins finished 19 of 26 for 247 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions, a 141.0 passer rating, and he added a one-yard touchdown run on a second-and-goal keeper in the third quarter. He was sacked once. On a day when the run game produced 95 yards on 33 carries, that is the version of Cousins this team needs.

Brock Bowers was the center of it. Seven catches on 10 targets for 92 yards and both of the passing touchdowns that came out of goal-line situations, plus a 27-yard catch on the first play of the second half that set the tone for the comeback. Michael Mayer added five catches for 53 yards on six targets and was the reliable second-level answer whenever Cousins needed seven yards. Jeanty touched the ball five times and produced 73 yards, which is the strangest line in the box score: three catches for 64 yards on four targets, and two carries for nine. Mike Washington Jr. carried 25 times for 83 yards, 3.3 a clip, with a long of 15.

Third down was the difference on this side of the ball. Las Vegas converted seven of 11, New York four of 11. The red zone was the other one. Four trips, four touchdowns, including two separate goal-line sequences where the Raiders got stuffed twice and still came away with seven. Explosive plays were scarce beyond Jeanty's 45 and Bowers' 27, and 5.6 yards a play does not usually win. It won here because 31 of the 38 points came from an offense that never gave the ball back. Tre Tucker was targeted once and caught nothing.

Defense

Five straight games allowing 30 or more points. That is the headline, and no amount of fourth-quarter credit erases it. Braelon Allen ran 21 times for 147 yards, 7.0 a carry, with a 21-yard touchdown that put the Jets up 30-21 in the third. The interior and the linebacker level lost that matchup from the opening series, when Allen went 15 yards to the Las Vegas four on the game's second snap. New York gained 166 yards on the ground at 6.1 a carry. Adonai Mitchell caught seven of nine targets for 142 yards and a touchdown, 20.3 a catch, with a 47-yard gain that the secondary never got over the top of.

What saved it was the red zone and the pass rush in the fourth quarter. The Jets reached the red zone six times and scored two touchdowns, settling for Sanders field goals of 21, 36, 39 and 31 yards. Four trips inside the 20 that produced 12 points instead of 28 is the entire margin. Nakobe Dean led with 12 tackles, Chinn had 10 plus the interception, Quay Walker nine, Eric Stokes eight with two passes defensed, and Stokes and the rest of that group held Garrett Wilson to six catches on 12 targets for 83 yards and no score.

Crosby won his matchup against the Jets edge protection without filling up a stat sheet: four tackles, a sack, a tackle for loss, two quarterback hits, and the pressure credited on Chinn's interception. He also had a 12-yard sack of Smith at 6:49 of the fourth wiped out by a defensive holding call on Hezekiah Masses, which turned a second-and-long into a Jets first down on a drive that ended in points. Tim Keenan III had the other sack. Two sacks and one takeaway on 32 pass attempts is thin, and only the timing of the takeaway makes it look better.

Special teams

This unit decided the game, and it is not close. Dylan Laube returned three kickoffs for 144 yards, a 48.0 average, including a 95-yard touchdown 12 seconds after New York had gone up 13-7 in the second quarter. That is seven points off a scoreboard that was about to get away. Gay was perfect, five extra points and the 53-yarder with the game on it. AJ Cole punted twice for a 53.5 average, one inside the 20, long of 57. Isaiah Williams got 66 yards on two kick returns and 22 on two punt returns for New York, which was manageable. Field position stayed neutral, and the Raiders still took 10 points out of the third phase.

Coaching

The halftime adjustment was real. Down 23-14 at the break, having already failed on fourth and one at the Jets 46 in the second quarter on a direct snap to Connor Heyward that went nowhere and survived replay review, Las Vegas scored touchdowns on three consecutive possessions covering 65, 65 and 84 yards. That is a staff that found something, most of it in the quick game to Bowers and Mayer.

The clock work in the fourth quarter was the best part. Taking over at the 35 with 4:31 left and a two-point lead, the Raiders ran Washington six times on a nine-play, 30-yard drive that bled four minutes and four seconds and forced New York to spend all three timeouts by the 3:26 mark. Then came the choice on fourth and five: kick for a five-point lead rather than go for it or hand New York the ball at midfield. Making Sanders irrelevant was the correct read of the situation, and it is why the Raiders won.

The fourth-and-one call in the second quarter was not good, and giving Jeanty two carries while a 3.3-a-carry back got 25 is a usage question that deserves an answer. Five penalties for 37 yards is clean enough, but one of them erased a sack and another put the Jets in field goal range at the end.

What it means

Las Vegas is 4-4, 3-1 on the road, and the four-game losing streak that followed a 3-0 start is over. The Jets fell to 2-6. The season is alive and the record looks respectable, which is more than it did at breakfast.

What has shown up now for five straight weeks is a defense that cannot keep a team under 30. Kansas City 30, New England 45, Buffalo 33, the Rams 35, and now the Jets 33. The run defense specifically has been a problem for three weeks running, and allowing 6.1 a carry to a 2-6 team is not a result that travels. The offense has answered by scoring, which works until it faces a defense that does not cooperate in the red zone.

What is next

San Francisco, Sunday at 1:25 p.m. Pacific at Levi's Stadium. The 49ers are 6-1 coming off a bye, having lost only at Atlanta, and they will not go two for six inside the 20 either. The question the Raiders have to answer in a week is whether they can hold up against a real running game, because 7.0 a carry to Braelon Allen will become something much worse in Santa Clara.