After dishing out a whirlwind of points and yardage over the first three-quarters of the season, the Colts have withered up on offense over their past four games.
"We've been underperforming in the month of December," tight end Dwayne Allen acknowledged ahead of Sunday's wild-card encounter with the Cincinnati Bengals, per ESPN.com's Mike Wells. "Now it's time to turn up and play our best football of the year."
Quarterback Andrew Luck has presided over an attack that has turned the ball over two or more times in five of their past six tilts while averaging just 67 rushing yards per game in December. It doesn't help that star wideout T.Y. Hilton hasn't been fully healthy while Reggie Wayne hasn't been himself, but all teams have issues late in the year.
"Just the results in the games haven't been there," Allen said. "The huge loss and embarrassment to Dallas. Then the narrow victories over a couple other teams. We haven't been playing the type of football we wanted to play.
"Our motto is to pound them and score 50. We haven't done that so far. It's time for us to regroup and time to make this playoff run."
The Colts in their finer moments have proven to be an explosive concoction, but they also emit the stink of a playoff team that might have peaked too early. We'll find out Sunday if Indy's long December still haunts the champions of the AFC South.
The latest Around The NFL Podcast previews this weekend's four Wild-Card matchups and predicts who will advance. Find more Around The NFL content on NFL NOW.
