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Most Plays Without Scoring a Touchdown

One of my favorite boxscores comes from a Steelers-Texans game in 2002. The Jets played at 4:15 that day, and I was living in Pennsylvania at the time, so I got to watch that game in its entirety. And the game was baffling on every level.

The expansion Texans had just three first downs the entire game. Three! David Carr completed 3 of 10 passes for 33 yards, with all three going to tight end Billy Miller. He was sacked four times, so Houston had 10 net passing yards on 14 dropbacks.

The Texans weren’t much better on the ground, running 26 times for 37 yards. That’s 47 total yards of offense with no touchdowns! In an entire game! And when you hear that the final score was 24-6, one would have to assume that Houston lost. But the didn’t. They won! They won 24-6!! In a game where they had 47 yards of offense and no touchdowns! That remains the fewest yards ever gained by a team in a winning effort. Steelers linebacker Joey Porter said it best:

Hold a team to under 50 yards offense, you’d think you’d have a chance to win at least….To get blown out when that happens, it’s tough.

Houston, of course, scored three defensive touchdowns, including two by former Jet Aaron Glenn. But what made watching the game even more confusing was that the Pittsburgh was pretty productive on offense, with 422 yards. Then again, the Steelers also had 15 drives and a whopping 95 plays, thanks due Houston recording eight 3-and-outs.

So why am I bringing that game up now? After watching the crazy Seahawks/Cardinals game last week, I was stunned by how Arizona was somehow kept out of the end zone all night. The Cardinals ran a whopping 90 plays, but the game ended in a 6-6 tie.

So I ran the numbers, and guess what? The only time in NFL history that a team ran more plays and failed to score a touchdown was Pittsburgh in that game against Houston.

The table below shows every game in NFL history where a team had 80 plays and zero offensive touchdowns:

TeamYearOppWkBoxscorePlaysW/LPFPA
PIT2002HOU14Boxscore95L624
ARI2016SEA7Boxscore90T66
IND2012BAL18Boxscore87L924
NYG1977CHI14Boxscore87L912
BAL1974DEN9Boxscore87L617
NYG2003NWE6Boxscore85L617
ARI2002DAL7Boxscore85W96
KAN1997JAX11Boxscore85L1024
NYG1987BUF6Boxscore85L36
CLE2011SEA7Boxscore84W63
SDG1999GNB7Boxscore84L331
NWE1995SFO3Boxscore84L328
WAS1985SFO13Boxscore84L835
KAN1989CLE11Boxscore83T1010
BUF1979DEN14Boxscore83L1619
CIN2004BAL3Boxscore82L923
NWE1999PHI15Boxscore82L924
ATL1977WAS2Boxscore82L610
PIT1975GNB6Boxscore82W1613
CHI2016GNB7Boxscore81L1026
NYJ2010MIA14Boxscore81L610
NWE1994CLE10Boxscore81L613
BUF1993NYJ8Boxscore81W1910
BUF1987NYG6Boxscore81W63
SFO1986WAS11Boxscore81L614
CLE1981HOU2Boxscore81L39
BAL2000TEN8Boxscore80L614
NWE1995DEN6Boxscore80L337
SFO1981CLE11Boxscore80L1215
NOR1975SFO10Boxscore80L616
DET1975HOU6Boxscore80L824
CLE1975DEN5Boxscore80L1516
CRD1942WAS9Boxscore80L028

Believe it or not, Arizona wasn’t the only offense from week seven to make the list: Chicago ran 81 plays against Green Bay on Thursday night, but none of those ended in with the Bears in the endzone.

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