Not all successful running games are created equal. But the NFL playoffs are proving that a good ground attack is still an avenue to victory.
Establishing the run in order to win in the NFL is not a novel concept.
Teams have been doing it for years, though the modern age of the prolific passing attack threatened to change that. In 2024, seven of the top-10 rushing units went to the postseason, including all of the top six.
But the first round of the playoffs truly separated good running games from the great ones – and the best ones moved onto the divisional round. Four of the six winning teams from the wild-card round also led the game in rushing yards and rushing attempts, while the Washington Commanders and Los Angeles Rams both only finished with 20 of fewer rushing yards in their respective wins.
This shouldn’t have been a surprise, though, considering the top-four teams in run success rate during the regular season also all won their first-round games – the Baltimore Ravens, Buffalo Bills, Commanders and Rams. The Philadelphia Eagles, who finished sixth behind the Detroit Lions, also won.
The Ravens, Bills, Commanders and Eagles also all finished better than the NFL average in yards before contact, meaning the threat of their quarterback running the ball, their scheme and/or their respective offensive lines set each running game up for success.
Meanwhile, the Denver Broncos, Minnesota Vikings, Los Angeles Chargers and Pittsburgh Steelers all finished well below the league average in both categories – and all lost.
Perhaps the biggest shock of the weekend was the Houston Texans. They finished 32nd in run success rate and 16th in yards before contact during the regular season but cruised to a win over the Chargers. Coincidentally, the Chargers run game also ranked poorly in 2024 (27th and 31st in run success rate and yards before contact, respectively) and Houston’s defense eventually dominated Los Angeles overall in the wild-card game.
When looking at the playoffs, a similar pattern occurred. The Bills and the Ravens led this past weekend with a run success rate of more than 50%, while the Eagles and Texans outpaced their opponents in run success rate and both enjoyed great yards per play averages on the ground.
The only real surprises were the Commanders and Rams, who both were actually worse on the ground in their wins. However, the Rams enjoyed a healthy 4.6 yards per play average, which ranked fourth on the weekend among playoff teams, in their playoff win over the Vikings.
This wild-card snapshot epitomizes the idea that not all success running games are created equal. And the wild-card round proved that so long as a team has an avenue to a good ground attack, it can win.
Each winning team showed different ways to build and maintain a good run game. Some teams had elite running backs who could dominate the ground. Others used the threat of a running quarterback to paralyze defenders. A solid run-blocking unit up front could make life easier as well. And a few of these teams had combinations of some or all of these support systems during their respective games.
Whatever the case may be, the partial formula for success in the playoffs this past weekend was a quality running game – one that can be the difference between playing football in mid-January or going home early.
Here’s how the remaining playoff teams used their running games to move on in the postseason.
An Elite Running Back
There was a bit of a narrative shift in 2024 when it came to running backs: The best ones were worth the money. Saquon Barkley, Derrick Henry and Josh Jacobs highlighted the biggest movements at the position, all earned sizable paychecks and enjoyed tremendous seasons.
Their new teams made the playoffs, too.
Most of the teams that moved in the postseason were also led by the best backs in the game. Henry, Barkley and Jahmyr Gibbs ranked first, second and third, respectively, in yards per carry this season and all are playing in the divisional round. Those three also rank in the top five in yards before contact, while Henry ranks in the top 10 in yards after contact.
While Gibbs didn’t play in the wild-card round because of the Lions’ first-round bye, Henry and Barkley played pivotal roles in their respective teams’ wins. Henry finished with 186 yards and two touchdowns on 26 carries in the Ravens’ win over the Steelers. Barkley finished with 119 scoreless yards on 25 carries in the Eagles’ win over the Green Bay Packers.
James Cook, who capped off his second consecutive 1,000-yard regular season with the Bills, finished the year in the top 10 in yards per carry and and yards before contact. He dominated the Broncos with 120 yards and a touchdown on 23 carries.
Basically, if you had a top-10 running back from the 2024 season in the playoffs, you had a pretty good chance of winning.
The only big exceptions were Josh Jacobs and Bucky Irving. Both were great during the regular season and solid in the playoffs, but weren’t on the winning sides of a litany of reasons not related to themselves.
The Threat of a Rushing QB
It always helps when your quarterback can run the ball at any given time. Teams that ranked above average in quarterback rushing attempts this season went 4-3 in the playoffs.
The top-four running quarterback teams all won, too, between Jalen Hurts’ Eagles, Lamar Jackson’s Ravens, Josh Allen’s Bills and Jayden Daniels’ Commanders. The teams that ranked below the NFL average went 2-5.
Teams that ranked above average in yards per rush by a quarterback also went 3-2 (with the losses coming against teams whose quarterbacks had a higher average), while those who were below average went 3-7.
That’s just taking the regular season into account. When you look at the actual playoff games, five of the six winning teams won the quarterback rushing battle in their respective matches. That included C.J. Stroud, who finished with 42 rushing yards on six attempts after he averaged fewer than 14 yards per game during the regular season.
The only one who didn’t was Matthew Stafford, who didn’t have a designed run after he averaged just 2.6 rushing yards per game in the regular season. At 36, he’s also oldest quarterback in the playoffs.
Teams that attempted at least four designed quarterback runs (not including scrambles or kneel downs) also went 4-1, with the lone exception being the Buccaneers.
The wildest part of all of this is that the Bills, Commanders and Ravens all saw a heavy box at least 60% of the time in their wild-card games and still won. It’s not a coincidence that those three teams also had the best rushing quarterbacks in the playoffs, too.
And while it may seem like a detriment facing a heavy box the vast majority of the time, it became an advantage because even with more defenders up front, opponents had to account for at least two runners on any given play rather than just the one.
Quality Run Blocking
Good running backs and the threat of a running QB can only take a team so far. You need good blocking to open the running lanes and keep the offense flowing at the right pace.
Oddly enough, not every winning team had good run blocking during the regular season. But that’s the beauty of how this all works. You don’t need to check off every box to have a good rush attack. And having a good run-blocking offensive line certainly didn’t hurt.
For instance, the Bills ranked 32nd in run blocking but because of the threat of Allen and Cook’s emergence as an elite running back, their ground game was fine.
The opposite worked for the Texans, who didn’t have that threat from Stroud but a good enough runner in Joe Mixon (who some may still claim is elite) to make the most of good run blocking. The Rams had a top-four run-blocking offensive line, a productive back in Kyren Williams but no QB rushing threat.
The Eagles, meanwhile, had all three. They were able to stave off the Packers despite a close battle and sub-par quarterback play from Hurts for most of the game
Oddly enough, most of the losing teams had good run-blocking offensive lines. The Chargers ranked fifth while the Vikings rank second. Neither could establish the run, though, either because of non-elite running backs (sorry, Aaron Jones and J.K. Dobbins) or because their quarterback wasn’t a true threat on the ground – especially in the playoff game.
Meanwhile, the Broncos had the 10th-best run-blocking offensive line and a good running quarterback but no elite running back.
The nuance of this leads to some ambiguity, but the most telling element is that all of the playoff teams had at least one of the three elements to establish a good running game. That paints of a picture of how to be a successful NFL team.
The next phase – and the one the winning teams in the wild-card round deployed – is continuing to exercise what worked in the regular season. The winning teams maintained their dominance of the ground to help build big leads, which in turn perpetuated the ground attack that started it all.
To boot: All the winning teams had at least two of a the three elements.
Moving to the Divisional Round
What comes next in the playoffs will continue to separate the good from the great from the best. If we apply what worked in the wild-card round to the divisional round, it becomes a bit harder to differentiate which teams will move on to AFC or NFC championship.
Each matchup will help determine what type of running game works the best for would-be Super Bowl contenders.
For instance, the Bills and Ravens both have elite rushers at running back and quarterback. Will they cancel each other out? Or will their respectively defenses find ways to thwart a big part of the other’s offense?
Meanwhile, the Commanders-Lions and Rams-Eagles matchups are battles between good running teams for very different reasons. The Texans-Chiefs game is intriguing, too, but because neither had great running games during the regular season and both have good defenses.
So maybe that is the barrier of entry for teams: You have to be great at running the ball for a variety of reasons for a better chance to make the divisional round.
It worked for the six winners in the wild-card round, and there’s a chance it gives them a leg up in the next round, too.
Check out our NBA, NFL, college basketball, FBS and FCS coverage. And follow along on Instagram, Bluesky, Threads, Facebook and X for more.
