BALTIMORE — Tylan Wallace caught the punt cleanly — no easy feat on this wet day — then slipped to his left, spinning away from one potential tackler and racing past a couple of more while barely staying inbounds along the sideline.
By the time Shaun Jolly came diving at his feet near the 45-yard line, Wallace had Baltimore in decent shape for a field goal. But after stumbling a bit, he stayed on his feet and kept running.
“I’m like, ‘I can’t go down right here. I made it this far,’ ” Wallace said.
In his first game returning punts as a pro, Wallace ran one back 76 yards for a touchdown in overtime to lift the Ravens to a 37-31 victory over Los Angeles on Sunday, snapping the Rams’ three-game winning streak.
Wallace became the fourth player in NFL history to score a touchdown on a punt return in OT. Xavier Gipson of the New York Jets also did it this season Sept. 11 against Buffalo.
“It just feels great to be able to make a difference in the game and help the team win,” Wallace said. “You could say a once-in-a-lifetime moment.”
The 24-year-old Wallace is in his third season after being drafted in the fourth round in 2021.
He has only six receptions in his career, plus a couple of kickoff returns as a rookie.
When Devin Duvernay, Baltimore’s top return man, left with back problems Sunday, Wallace was pressed into duty. He returned three punts in the game, and his final one more than made up for a crucial penalty he committed in the second quarter that led to points for Los Angeles.
Baltimore (10-3) took a half-game lead on Miami for the AFC’s top seed. The Dolphins host Tennessee on Monday night.
Jolly had the last real chance to bring Wallace down, and after he couldn’t quite do it, the Baltimore returner punctuated the winning touchdown with a leap into the end zone before the Ravens mobbed him in the corner.
“It was mountains and valleys. It was peaks, and there was lows in that game,” Baltimore coach John Harbaugh said. “National Football League in December against a very, very good opponent. Our guys just weather all those storms, figuratively and literally out there.”
Catching passes and punts was an adventure on a rainy day in Baltimore, but Lamar Jackson and Matthew Stafford threw three touchdown passes apiece. Jackson passed for 316 yards and Stafford for 294. Each offense went three-and-out in overtime before the final Los Angeles punt.
