1973 Atlanta Falcons season
The 1973 Atlanta Falcons season was the franchise's eighth year in the National Football League. The team improved on their previous season's output of 7–7 and achieved their best record until 1980, but failed to reach a maiden playoff berth.
Atlanta opened the season with a massive 62-7 victory at New Orleans led by five interceptions of Archie Manning and 13 completions in 15 attempts with 3 touchdowns by Dick Shiner, who was the first quarterback in NFL history to be officially credited with a perfect 158.3 passer rating. He was relieved by Lee (quarterback)|Bob Lee] in the second half. After this explosive showing, the Falcons lost three straight without scoring any touchdowns. Then Lee took over as starter and completed 11 of 13 passes with his own perfect 158.3 rating in a 46-6 blowout of Chicago. This sparked a seven-game winning streak which included defeating 1973 Minnesota [Vikings season|the Vikings] when that team was 9–0 and looking at emulating the previous season‘s Dolphins’ perfect season.
Despite entering the last month of the regular season at 8–3, they were upset by the Buffalo Bills, forcing them into a race with the Washington Redskins for the wild card playoff spot. The NFL's tiebreaker format at the time, which favored teams with the best combined scoring offense and defense, necessitated a blowout win over a Cardinals team that had won only one of its last ten and was playing an unknown quarterback, Gary Keithley. However, while Keithley completed only ten of 32 passes, the Falcons were instead blown out 32–10 at home courtesy of an unexpected Cardinals rushing game and six field goals from Jim Bakken. Although the Falcons won the regular season finale to end the season at 9–5, Washington also won and qualified as the wild card with a 10–4 record.
Despite the Falcons’ success between 2008 and 2012, the win over the Vikings was the last time the Falcons defeated the last unbeaten NFL team until they defeated the 14–0 Carolina Panthers in week 16 of the 2015 season.