Anthony Cathirell’s Sporting News

St. Louis 19, Washington 17

In shocking the red-hot Redskins, Jim Haslett became only the second of 14 interim head coaches since 2000 to win his first game. Haslett has tried many things in an effort to change the culture of the team and the organization. One of them was having all the off-field members of the organization join the players for lunch last week. There’s no telling how that might have affected the team’s play, but the bottom line is Sunday’s game ended with Josh Brown kicking a 49-yard field goal with no time left on the clock to give the Rams their first win since Dec. 2, 2007.

The Rams had to overcome a 15-yard misconduct penalty against Richie Incognito for saying something to an official that apparently didn’t go over well. This game was a classic example of the competitive balance in the NFL. The Redskins had just won two consecutive road games against NFC East opponents, and had four straight wins overall. The previously-winless Rams had allowed 36.7 points per game prior to Sunday.

Despite the fourth-quarter craziness, the play that hurt the Redskins the most occurred in the final 20 seconds of second quarter. With Washington leading 7-3 and in position to add to the lead, Redskins quarterback Jason Campbell had a first-down pass blocked. Guard Pete Kendall caught the batted pass, but he fumbled while trying to advance it. Rams safety O.J. Atogwe picked up the ball and ran 75 yards for touchdown. They don’t keep stats on this sort of thing, but I firmly believe that if you look back in history, you will see that teams that score right before halftime win a high percentage of those games.

Haslett will do a good job of getting his team ready to play as they return home this week to face the Cowboys. Dallas needs to be wary.