DENVER – Although the Broncos improved to 3-0 with a 37-21 win against the Raiders in Week 3, one of the team's captains wasn't satisfied with the way the game unfolded.
Denver's defense surrendered 342 yards to the Raiders and gave up a pair of second-half touchdowns without forcing a single turnover in the game.
That's an outing that isn't acceptable to linebacker Wesley Woodyard, who along with cornerback Champ Bailey make up the Broncos' two season-long defensive captains.
"Definitely happy with a win," Woodyard said. "We'll definitely take a win any time we can get one. But like I said, we gave up too many points. We've got to stop that leakage football."
Raiders third-year quarterback Terrelle Pryor finished 19-of-28 for 281 yards with one touchdown and zero interceptions for a passer rating of 112.4. He also added four carries for 36 yards.
Pryor set career highs in completion percentage, passing yardage and quarterback rating, something that Woodyard wasn't happy to see his group allow.
"The game plan was simple – even when we did allow him to run out, we had somebody over the top of him," Woodyard said. "We wanted to just contain him and not let him get it started with his feet. He could kill us with his feet and make plays extending the passing game, so that's something that we wanted to do – contain him. We let him out a couple of times."
"I think it's great," quarterback Peyton Manning said of Woodyard's expectations for the defense. "It's what you want. You want guys certainly excited about the win, but learning what we can do to be better."
A Montee Ball fumble late in the fourth quarter set up Oakland with a short field on their final possession, which ended in a touchdown. Even though the Raiders took over at the Denver 20, Woodyard did not allow for that to be an excuse to surrender a touchdown.
"It doesn't matter if they get the ball on the 1-inch yard line," Woodyard said. "It's our job to stop them and we didn't do that in the fourth quarter."
Woodyard singled out the need to finish stronger as a key area for improvement. Although they held the Raiders to negative-1 yards on the ground, Oakland picked up 99 in the air and converted on two-of-three third downs in the final frame.
"The thing is, once we put the hammer down, we've got to keep it down," Woodyard said. "Our fourth-quarter defense has to be better. It carried over from last year. We've got to continue to get better. We've got to play tougher in those last minutes. Even when guys are down, we've got to learn to get that killer mentality. Just make sure we don't let a team back into the game."
