It takes muscle and endurance to beat the Baltimore Ravens defense; along with a few missed Ed Reed tackle (have you ever seen him miss so many tackles against the Bengals?). Cedric Benson's rushing performance against the Ravens is in large part why the Bengals were able to beat a team that was favored in both games. The first time around, Benson rushed for 120 yards on 27 carries, which was the first time in 40 games that anyone rushed for 100 yards or more against the Ravens. Adrian Peterson would accomplish the same feat, rushing for 143 yards the following week.
So what does Benson do? He follows it up with another 100-yard performance. Dave Lapham asked the question. Who was the last running back to rush for 100 yards in consecutive meetings against the Ravens? Rudi Johnson actually came three yards short in 2005, rushing for 97 yards on November 6 and 114 yards on November 27. Both wins. Corey Dillon did do it in two seasons, rushing for 102 yards on November 10, 2002 and 127 yards on December 23, 2001. Pragmatic writes (through a Joe Reedy spirit or Twitter account) that it was Ricky Williams that last rushed for 100 yards against the Ravens in back-to-back games between 2002 and 2003. This Baltimore Sun article confirms it, writing that the Ravens defense "haven't allowed 100 yards to a running back in consecutive meetings since Miami's Ricky Williams in 2002-2003."
And more specific to our division's history, which running back has rushed for 100 yards against the Baltimore Ravens defense twice in one season? We looked. We scanned. The best we came up with was Jerome Bettis in 1997 -- rushed for 137 yards on October 5 and 114 yards on November 9 (if someone else, let us know).
| Benson's rushing performance broken down by quarters | |||||
| Att | Yards | AVG | LG | TD | |
| 1st Q | 9 | 45 | 5.0 | 21 | 1 |
| 2nd Q | 9 | 35 | 3.9 | 15 | 0 |
| 3rd Q | 7 | 19 | 2.7 | 4 | 0 |
| 4th Q | 9 | 18 | 2.0 | 6 | 0 |
| 34 | 117 | 3.4 | 21 | 1 | |
As for the league, Chris Johnson put together another fine performance against the San Francisco 49ers rushing for 135 yards on 25 carries. He leads the league with 959 yards. Steven Jackson and Adrian Peterson were both off this week, allowing Benson to jump into second with 837 yards rushing.
One last impressive stat. Benson has recorded a rushing touchdown in four straight games, and six of the eight games this year.