Trey Smith on the Chiefs' Latest Game-Winning Drive: 'It's Just Classic Patrick Mahomes'
The Kansas City Chiefs are no stranger to last-second victories, but going down to the wire against the Carolina Panthers surely wasn't the plan for KC's 10th win of the 2024 NFL season.
Looking back on a game where the Chiefs' offensive line allowed five sacks of quarterback Patrick Mahomes, it wasn't a pristine day at the stadium for Chiefs right guard Trey Smith and the rest of KC's up-and-down O-line, but the result was familiar: The Chiefs' offense, led by quarterback Patrick Mahomes, made the game-winning drive before time expired.
To kick off his media availability on Monday, Smith was asked about his view of Mahomes's late-game scramble and what it's like to see his quarterback continually make plays like that one when the game is on the line.
"It's just classic Patrick Mahomes, man," Smith said. "Just extending plays and just being the ultimate competitor, finding a way to win and doing whatever it takes for us to have victory and us to get the win."
Later, Smith was asked about the Chiefs' late-game success and what kind of mental approach the team brings to those situations.
"The approach is pretty much the same," Smith said. "Just trying to be as focused and locked in in the moment, understanding what you need to do at your job and what's required from your job in that situation. I think it requires elite focus to understand the task at hand. You have a great operator in Patrick Mahomes who's going to coordinate everyone and get everything finely tuned the way we need it to be, and, at the end of the day, if we all can just focus on our single role playing together — football's the ultimate team sport — we all focus on our singular goal and objective, and we'll be able to accomplish our goals and be successful."
The Chiefs have repeatedly found themselves in games that aren't decided until the final seconds tick off the clock, leaving Kansas City to hold firm in nail-biters throughout the year. What does it feel like to repeatedly end games with walk-off wins?
"There's a lot of parity in this league, and any time you get a W, any time you get a win, you're going to be happy and excited about it," Smith said. "Being able to walk off the field and get the dub in that fashion's always cool, but at the end of the day, there's so much parity in this league, I can't reiterate that enough. Any time you can get a win, you're going to be happy about it. They're very hard to come by in this league, and we'll take a W on that scoreboard any single time we get it."