The Ravens were able to cut a 20-point Patriots lead down to three points on Monday night, but their comeback stalled there and the Patriots ended the game as 30-23 winners.
The rebound made for a tighter end, but it didn’t make the result any sunnier for members of the Ravens. Linebacker Terrell Suggs said in his postgame comments that there aren’t any moral victories and that the game felt like a “shot in the mouth” for a team that got a reminder about the dangers of starting slow.
Wide receiver Steve Smith had a similar take when it came the team’s rally.
“I was not happy with the loss,” Smith said. “Are we happy when we battled back? It was like getting a terrible sandwich. You bite into it, it’s still terrible, but you give the person who made it kudos.”
Suggs called the game a “shot in the mouth” and said the Ravens are now playing a three-game season. There’s no margin for error left in that season if the Ravens want to make it to the postseason, so they’ll need to show they can still tap into that resiliency after this loss.