Demaryius Thomas made history Sunday night with a Super Bowl record 13 receptions for 118 yards and the Broncos lone touchdown. He won’t be celebrating the achievement, however.
“Not right now, we lost,” the talented wide receiver said after his Broncos were walloped, 43-8, by the Seahawks in Super Bowl XLVIII at MetLife Stadium. “The main thing was coming and and winning. The record doesn’t mean anything right now.
“My focus is we got beat, we lost the Super Bowl. That’s all I’m worried about.”
Thomas surpassed the previous record of 11 receptions held by Dan Ross (Bengals), Jerry Rice (49ers). Deion Branch (Patriots) and Wes Welker (Patriots), his current Broncos teammate. He was the lone bright spot in an otherwise terrible night for Denver. Rice still has the record for most yards in a Super Bowl game with 215.
Yet it was far from a perfect night for Thomas, who also lost a fumble in the third quarter with Denver driving deep in Seattle territory already down 29-0.
“Just trying to do too much,” he explained. “Trying to make a play. [Seahawks cornerback Byron Maxwell] did a great job, hitting the ball and getting it out. I was trying to make a move and he punched it out.”
A fourth-year pro out of Georgia Tech taken in the first round of the 2010 NFL Draft, Thomas found holes in the vaunted Seattle Cover 3, making the biggest plays of the night for Denver.
“I was just trying to do my job, helping out my team and trying to put some points on the board,” Thomas said.
The two-time Pro Bowler backed up his talk leading up to the game, when he said Seahawks trash-talking cornerback Richard Sherman— the self-proclaimed best cornerback in the NFL — had a “weakness.”
His big performance came on the heels of his phenomenal AFC championship game performance, when Thomas hauled in seven catches for 134 yards and a touchdown. Thomas also plays big in Denver’s playoff opener, making eight catches for 54 yards and a score in a win over the Chargers.
Thomas is coming off a monster season, a 92-catch, 1,430-yard year in which he joined the league’s elite group of wide receivers. He was named to the Associated Press All-Pro team for the first time and now a Super Bowl record.
Eventually, he said, Sunday night’s accomplishment will matter.
“At the same time, I’ll always know in the back of my head we didn’t win the game,” he said.