ENGLEWOOD, Colo. –After 30 minutes of play the last time the Broncos traveled to San Diego, the team trailed 24-0 and was 30 minutes from taking a 2-4 record into the bye week.
But then the Broncos stormed out of the locker room, and 35 unanswered points later, were on their way back to Denver with a 3-3 record.
"That was one of my favorite games of all time," tight end Joel Dreessen said. "I've never been a part of something like that where we were down 24-0 at half, everyone's in trouble at halftime, we get sent to our lockers and we come out and just everything is working. It was just such a fun, fun half to come back and be a part of."
The momentum didn't stop after the bye-week break.
The Broncos reeled off 10 more consecutive wins to close out the regular season with a 13-3 record. Since that game, Denver is 18-1 in regular season games – the best record in the league in that span.
"I think the record speaks for itself. It was a tremendous turnaround," Interim Head Coach/Defensive Coordinator Jack Del Rio said. "It was a pivotal point in the year. We kind of found ourselves at that point and have played great since. We go back and we understand that they did things that put us behind and we didn't do some things we need to that put us behind. Anytime you do that, you're in the NFL, a team is very capable of putting you in a hole."
When that game was played, Mike McCoy was the Broncos' offensive coordinator and Quentin Jammer, Shaun Phillips and Louis Vasquez were all Chargers. Now McCoy is the Chargers' head coach while Jammer, Phillips and Vasquez are Broncos.
"That's right," Dreessen laughed. "I asked Shaun Phillips once, I was like, 'Man, what did you guys think when we came back from 24 points down?' He was like, 'Man, there was nothing we could do. What do you mean what did we think?'"
When asked what would have happened had the team not pulled off the historic comeback, Joel Dreessen smiled.
"You're right, we're staring 2-4 right in the face and going into the bye week," he said. "That would have been not good. That would have been momentum-killing for the season. But it didn't happen that way."
