Going into Saturday's game against the St. Louis Rams, most Arizona Cardinals fans probably predicted that it would be a close game, but likely few of them foresaw that Beanie Wells would set an offensive record and Patrick Peterson would tie another en route to a 23-20 Cardinals victory.
In the third quarter, Peterson returned a punt 80 yards for a touchdown, which put the Cardinals ahead 20-10 at the time of the score. With the touchdown, his fourth of 2011, Peterson tied the NFL record for most punt returns for a touchdown in a single season. He's the first player ever to have four punt returns of 80 or more yards in a season.
The other historic day belonged to running back Wells, whose 27 carries resulted in a Cardinals single-game record of 228 rushing yards. The previous single-game mark was 214, set by LeShon Johnson in 1996. After a long stretch of games where Wells had short average yardage, he finished the day with an average carry of 8.4, with a long of 71 yards. He also contributed the only other Cardinals touchdown in the game.
The ground attack ended up carrying the game, as quarterback John Skelton had another shaky start. He finished the game going 12-for-23 with 114 passing yards, 18 rushing yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions, good for a paltry 30.0 NFL rating.
Kicker Jay Feely contributed the remaining offense for the Cardinals, going three-for-three on field goal attempts from 29, 37 and 22 yards, the last of which proved to be the difference maker in the fourth quarter.
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