Doug Pederson gets Jaguars rivalry with Titans, 3 Week 14 takeaways

One thing that became clear during Urban Meyer’s short stint as the head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars was that he didn’t know his players’ names and often had no idea who their opponents were. Conversely, Doug Pederson has the Jags steering in the right direction and one reason is his strong understanding of the team and their division rivalries.

On the days preceding Jacksonville’s division matchup against the Tennesse Titans, Pederson told the media that “these are the kind of game you must love playing in“. To get his players amped up for the Tennessee Titans, Pederson prepared a “history lesson”.

Jaguars HC Doug Pederson’s history lesson ahead of win vs. Titans

Following their 36-22 in Week 14, tight end Evan Engram told the media that their head coach taught him and his teammates a bit about the Jags’ rivalry with the Titans.

“Had a nice history lesson this week on the history between these two teams, where we are, and our season”, Engram said. And what we have to do this last stretch of games. This one was big and we kind of got a glimpse of that last night as a motivation.

“We came out, we were ready. We had a great week of practice. We had fun at practice, and we just trusted our process and we put our process to the test today. Defense, offense, special teams had a big one call back, which is unfortunate but we all answered the ball today. It was fun”, Engram said.

The best teachers are those that can successfully get you engaged on whatever topic they’re explaining regardless of how tough or boring it might be. In Week 14, Pederson got Jaguars players to make it personal against the Titans and to make losing a division game not acceptable. That’s what makes him the right coach to right the ship following a dearth of success in recent years. Here are other takeaways from the Jaguars’ convincing win over their division foes.