Jaguars coach Doug Pederson isn't questioning Trevor Lawrence's freelance touchdown

John Unitas once said that a quarterback hasn’t arrived “until you can tell the coach to go to hell.”

Trevor Lawrence didn’t go that far on a key play during Sunday’s 36-22 victory over the Tennessee Titans, breaking an eight-game losing streak in Nashville.

But neither did he run the play called by coach Doug Pederson. And since it resulted in a touchdown and the Jaguars (5-8) won the game, everyone could have a good chuckle about it after the fact.

“He knew what he was doing,” Pederson said during a news conference Monday at TIAA Bank Field, in which he recapped the first victory over the Titans at Nissan Stadium since 2013 and began to look ahead to Sunday's home game against Dallas (10-3) at 1 p.m.

Pederson did have one note of caution that he likely has already delivered to his quarterback.

“We don’t want to make a habit of it,” he said.

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On a day filled with crucial plays on both sides of the ball, Lawrence’s 1-yard touchdown run on the opening drive of the third quarter was arguably one of the most important.

Consider the situation: The Jags had taken a 20-14 halftime lead and because they won the opening coin toss, got the kickoff to start the third quarter.

Jamal Agnew broke up the middle and took the kickoff 98 yards for a touchdown that sent Jaguars fans into a state of euphoria. But a holding penalty on Caleb Johnson — who barely nudged the defender — brought the play back.

Lawrence then proceeded to continue his surgical carving of the Titans defense, completing 7 of 8 passes for 67 yards to give the Jaguars a first-and-goal at the Titans’ 6.

Tennesse’s Bud Dupree helped the Jags by jumping offsides to put the ball at the 3 and Travis Etienne gained 2 tough yards to the 1.

Pederson called a simple dive play to Etienne to the left. Tight end Evan Engram went in motion to that side and at the snap, Lawrence said he saw linebacker Dylan Cole charge over the opening Engram left.

Had Lawrence handed the ball to Etienne, he would have scored easily. Guards Brandon Scherff and Tyler Shatley and center Luke Fortner sealed off the middle nicely and tackle Cam Robinson and Engram blocked two defenders to create a huge lane for Etienne to get through.

But Lawrence said the sight of Cole coming in so quickly led him to believe he had a chance of stopping Etienne in the backfield (the Titans had already thrown Etienne for no gain or losses on five carries to that point) and he pulled the ball out of Etienne’s stomach and started running right.

At that point, Cole had a chance to stop Lawrence cold. But in one of the iconic plays of the season so far, Lawrence stiffed-arm Cole, who has 20 pounds on the Jags’ quarterback and dove into the end zone for his fourth rushing touchdown of the season.

It gave the Jaguars a 27-14 lead. They went on to score on Lawrence’s second TD pass of the day to Engram and a third Riley Patterson field goal and there would be no Music City Miracle.

Lawrence executed the play so deftly that at the time everyone thought it was a read-option. But Pederson played coy during his post-game news conference and said with a smile, “I’ll let him explain that play.”

Lawrence did, and came clean about his freelancing.

“Honestly, I probably should have handed it,” he said. "But … I had [Cole] on the edge, he stepped down one or two steps and I really felt like I could out-run him to the pylon and that’s just what I did.”

Lawrence fully understood that Cole could have made the play for lost yardage had he not been able to stiff-arm him.

“He recovered a little better than I thought he would so it was close to being a TFL [tackle for loss],” Lawrence said. “That’s one of those plays if you make it, it’s great like it was, but if you don’t make them, it’s a bad play. If you score no one is mad. If you don’t it is a different story.”

Pederson admitted he and the other offensive coaches on the sidelines couldn’t quite believe what they were seeing.

“He’s a sharp guy,” he said of Lawrence. “[Cole] came off the edge and he saw him kind of flash and bend off the corner and he instinctively pulled the football. Sort of a bewildered look on the sideline for me and everybody else … like, ‘what is he doing?’ But he knew what he was doing.”

Pederson said he did discuss with Lawrence what could have gone wrong on the sideline.

“My philosophy is you always coach off the touchdowns and good plays,” he said. “That’s the best time to coach guys. I’m not going to fault him for it because it’s something he saw.”

Lawrence stacked one more huge game and a series of big plays on top of his recent hot streak that began after he threw two interceptions and accounted for only 133 yards in a loss to Denver in London.

Lawrence completed 32 of 40 passes (16 of 17 in the second half) for a career-high 368 yards and three touchdowns. He connected with Engram 11 times for 162 yards, marking the fourth game in a row in which a Jags wide receiver has topped 100 yards, joining Christian Kirk (twice) and Zay Jones.

In the five games since then, Lawrence has thrown for 1,362 yards, 10 touchdowns, no turnovers, for a 71.8 completion percentage, 7.5 yards per attempt and a 111.71 passer rating.

For kicks, he’s run for 119 yards on 19 carries (6.3 per carry).

Lawrence has 3,202 yards, 20 TDs, a 66.1 completion percentage and a 95.44 passer rating.

He also had a monster game after barely practicing all week because of a sprained big toe on his left foot against Detroit. Pederson said in response to jokes that he might not let Lawrence practice the rest of the season if he turns in games like Sunday.

“We’ll see where he is on Wednesday,” Pederson said. “Obviously he’s going to be sore. I definitely want to get him out there.”

Wait and see on Walker

Rookie defensive end Travon Walker, who had his first sack in six games, forcing a fumble that led to the Jags’ first touchdown, will be day-to-day with an ankle injury. He underwent an MRI on Monday but the results were not yet known.

The other injury in the game was to safety Andrew Wingard, who banged up his shoulder making a tackle on Titans receiver Nick Westbrook-Ikhine on the first possession of the game. Wingard was listed as questionable to return but he not only came back on the next possession to nail Derrick Henry for a 1-yard loss but pulled in his fourth career interception in the second quarter to set up a Patterson field goal.

Pederson said Wingard should be good for the Cowboys game.

Cisco making progress

Wingard started for the third game in a row, and for the second game in a row in place of Andre Cisco, who continues to struggle with a shoulder injury.

Pederson said Cisco is improving.

“He’s going to be day-to-day again [but] the shoulder is getting better,” he said. “I’m optimistic that he’ll have another full week of practice and when we’ll see at the end of the week.”

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Trevor Lawrence's freelance touchdown is forgiven by Doug Pederson