3 winners, 3 losers from Bengals’ historic Week 17 win vs. Chiefs

The Cincinnati Bengals are AFC North champs! I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of saying that.

Did anyone really think the stripes would be here when the season began? Sure, some of us thought a Wild Card appearance could be possible but did anyone realistically see the Bengals winning the division over the Browns, Ravens, and Steelers?

Well, they just did. They’ll don the AFC North hats and tees and host a playoff game for the first time since 2015. No matter how this season ends, it’s hard to look at this 2021 campaign as a disappointment considering where this team was a year ago.

While the win was a huge one, there were plenty of losers for Cincinnati in this one. I know I typically stick with keeping things positive after a win but normally that’s in blowout wins, which this game was not. Remember — Entering halftime, the Bengals were down 28-17 and looked like they’d be down two scores for the rest of the game.

Fortunately, both sides played well to finish up the game, and here we are, repping the AFC North after some really tough years.

Because we’re still riding high from the 34-31 win, we’ll start with the losers and then finish up on a positive note and discuss who the winners were in this game.