After three possessions of mostly nothingness, Andy Dalton was strip sacked by Cameron Wake to give the Dolphins the ball deep in Bengals’ territory with a great chance to open scoring. That fizzled quickly, leading to a 34-yard field goal attempt that resulted in Caleb Sturgis shanking the everloving shit out of the ball.
A full quarter into the game, the Bengals finally got something going on offense by, surprisingly finding A.J. Green fir first downs. The Bengals, too, had to settle for a field goal, though they actually connected to give Cincy a 3-0 lead to open scoring.
The Dolphins were set up yet again when Lamar Miller broke away along the right sideline on a carry that started just shy of midfield, but he was stripped once he got inside the Bengals’ 10. It was recovered by Pacman Jones (O HE GONE SHINE) and taken to the Cincy 40.
The Bengals couldn’t do anything with it, and thus the Dolphins embarked on yet another promising drive. This time, it lead to points, even if it was Ryan Tannehill’s first rushing touchdown of the season, on a dive over the pile on the goal line.
Just before half, Dalton threw an ugly interception on a curl route near midfield with 30 seconds left in the second quarter and no timeouts. That gave Sturgis another shot inside 40 and this time, he got it, to give the Dolphins a 10-3 lead going into half. Miami ended the first half with 142 rushing yards and Geno Atkins has left the game with a knee injury, so not looking so great for Cincy at the moment.