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The Jacksonville Jaguars had some offensive struggles early, but rallied in the second half to beat the Atlanta Falcons 24-14 to close out the 2012 NFL preseason. The team started out rough with a botched toss play, as Blaine Gabbert turned to pitch the ball and saw it bounce off of Greg Jones' leg and the Falcons recovered right near the endzone, quickly picking up a touchdown and the early 7-0 lead.
"It was a toss sweep and it’s something we can control. That is an error on my part," Gabbert said at halftime. "We have to do our best job to recover the football. Fumbles happen in football. It’s a play we have run thousands of times but it just happened to nick him (Greg Jones)."
The team was able to settle in a bit after that and begin to pick up some yards on the legs of starting running back Rashad Jennings.
Jennings finished the game with 11 carries for 34 yards, picking up some tough yardage and probably playing a bit more than the team would have liked.
"Yeah they did," Jaguars head coach Mike Mularkey said at halftime about the starters playing longer than anticipated.
"They played I think around 30 snaps and we had a 22-play drive that in the long run is going to be good for us," said Mularkey. "That’s what we’re all about, controlling the ball, now we just got to finish a drive and make a touchdown. But that’s going to be the mentality of this offense is wearing defenses down."
The Jaguars were able to settle down in the second half and picked up explosive plays from the likes of Kevin Elliott who broke a few tackles on a slant pass from Chad Henne and galloped to a 77-yard touchdown. Running backs Keith Toston and Jalen Parmele also ripped off some long runs as the offense went on to put up 450 total yards and help the Jaguars win 24-14.