and how could it tackle any worse, really?<\/a> \u2014 the production would turn around quickly.<\/p>\n\u201cIt was embarrassing and we knew it was,\u201d Singleton said Sunday evening. But it was also so elementary that it didn\u2019t require anything resembling wholesale changes.<\/p>\n
The Broncos\u2019 charter landed back in Denver shortly after 1 a.m., meaning players and coaches didn\u2019t get back to their cars at the team facility until the wee hours of Tuesday morning. Before heading home for some shut-eye, Singleton and Joseph had a quick parking lot chat.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was just, \u2018Bring these guys together and we\u2019ll go play our brand of football,\u2019\u201d Singleton said of Joseph\u2019s message. \u201cThat\u2019s what we were able to do today.\u201d<\/p>\n
From the jump, really.<\/p>\n
The Denver defense forced punts on Jacksonville\u2019s first two drives of the afternoon before surrendering a 72-yard touchdown drive that was set up by a 32-yard completion to Parker Washington in which he ran free through the middle of Denver\u2019s defense.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe in what we\u2019re running,\u201d Singleton said. \u201cWe made some adjustments early in the second quarter and we were able to pretty much shut them out after that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, the Jaguars took the ball into scoring territory three more times but came away with just six points, including a missed 54-yard field goal, in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought they were outstanding,\u201d head coach Sean Payton said of his defenders.<\/p>\n
Denver defense is built for \u2018the bumps\u2019<\/p>\n
The Denver offense turned Moss\u2019 interception and the missed field goal into touchdown drives of their own, revving into gear just in time.<\/p>\n
![\"Quarterback](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/TDP-L-BroncosVsJags-20260920-TH-36.jpg\")
Quarterback Bo Nix (10) of the Denver Broncos throws during the second half a 20-13 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026, at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver. (Photo by Timothy Hurst\/The Denver Post)<\/p>\n
In that way, it looked a lot like so many of the Broncos\u2019 wins in 2025. Dominant defense and a late surge from quarterback Bo Nix.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s why a lot of these players are here, from a make-up standpoint,\u201d Payton said of his team. \u201cThey\u2019re not here for the wins. They\u2019re here for some of the bumps that we know are going to come. It was much better, obviously, defensively, better in the second half offensively, and on special teams. It was a good team we played.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a good win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perhaps, ultimately, it shouldn\u2019t be a surprise that the Broncos defense played well. Overwhelmingly, that\u2019s been the way of the world for them over the past two-plus seasons. At the same time, however, the challenge on this day was two-fold: First, Week 1 wasn\u2019t just bad. It was as thorough a breakdown in basic tackling as you\u2019ll find in the NFL. Then, the not-too-distant visage of Lawrence ripping up essentially this same defense for 279 yards and four total touchdowns in clinical fashion last December loomed fairly fresh in the club\u2019s collective memory.<\/p>\n
In that game, Lawrence and head coach Liam Coen engineered four touchdowns in five red zone trips, by far the worst day of the season for the Broncos\u2019 otherwise league-leading defense in that department.<\/p>\n
This time around, Denver was much stingier thanks, in part, to a red-zone plan put together by outside linebackers coach Isaac Shewmaker.<\/p>\n
In that game, the Jaguars converted 8-of-15 third-down chances and rolled to 346 offensive yards. On Sunday, they converted three of their first five third-down attempts but then went just 2-of-7 the rest of the way, finishing with 268 total yards.<\/p>\n
On that day, the Broncos\u2019 defense wilted and an 11-game winning streak ended. This time around, it rose to the occasion and kept a losing streak from taking root.<\/p>\n
This time, the defense held serve in the home opener.<\/p>\n
This time, it helped the Broncos get back on track \u2014 and delivered the team to its first normal game week of the season on more stable ground.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s early in the season,\u201d defensive lineman Eyioma Uwazurike said. \u201cWhether you like it or not, in the first couple of games, there\u2019s going to be mistakes until everybody settles into their role. Definitely, we did a good job correcting a lot of the stuff from last week and carrying into this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to do the same from this game and carry it into the next game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Want more Broncos news? Sign up for the Broncos Insider to get all our NFL analysis.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 10 feet of Empower Field grass, the Broncos defense found plenty of real estate to make a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":405966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49424,10851,9788,161230,49425,16516,20345,10837,105288,161231,48181,116,118,117,49426,114,16468,119,161188,49259,110,161232,48182,5011,49260,161233],"class_list":["post-405965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-alex-singleton","tag-bo-nix","tag-broncos","tag-broncos-country","tag-broncos-defense","tag-colorado","tag-denver","tag-denver-broncos","tag-empower-field-at-mile-high","tag-eyioma-uwazurike","tag-front-range","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-justin-strnad","tag-latest-headlines","tag-more-broncos-news","tag-nfl","tag-riley-moss","tag-sean-payton","tag-sports","tag-src","tag-sun-valley","tag-trevor-lawrence","tag-vance-joseph","tag-zach-allen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Cornerback](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/TDP-L-BroncosVsJags-20260920-TH-47.jpg\")
Cornerback Riley Moss (21) of the Denver Broncos celebrates his interception of quarterback Trevor Lawrence (16) of the Jacksonville Jaguars during the second half a 20-13 win on Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026, at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver. (Photo by Timothy Hurst\/The Denver Post)