San Diego Chargers defensive back Marcus Gilchrist intercepted Shaun Hill to guide his side to a 27-24 victory over the St Louis Rams to keep Mike McCoy's men in the playoff hunt.
The Chargers' defense came up with a huge play on the Rams' first series when Hill was intercepted by Brandon Flowers. Flowers fumbled the ball, but it was gathered by Melvin Ingram, which allowed Philip Rivers to engineer a drive that saw Nick Novak kick a field goal.
St Louis answered the Chargers with a methodical drive that lasted eight minutes as Tre Mason ran the ball effectively between the tackles, while Hill completed short passes underneath the defense. The visitors were held to three points as Greg Zuerlein fired a 22-yarder through the posts.
Rivers led his side downfield again as two completions to Keenan Allen and Eddie Royal moved them into the redzone. However, when he tried to throw to the endzone his pass was picked off by Janoris Jenkins and returned all the way for a St Louis score.
The visitors could have moved further ahead when Hill put them in field-goal range, but Zuerlein's kick was blocked and recovered by the Chargers. Just before the break the Chargers managed to put a scoring drive together which resulted in a field goal from Novak.
In the second half, the Chargers took the lead when Rivers handed the ball off to Ryan Mathews, and the back managed to find a hole in the defense to power through and sprint 32 yards to the endzone.
San Diego extended their advantage when Corey Liuget got to Hill in the pocket and strip sacked the quarterback, allowing Andrew Gachkar to pick up the ball and run in for the touchdown.
The Rams responded when Allen muffed a punt inside his own 20-yard line, which allowed Hill to hand the ball off to Tavon Austin on an end-around. The receiver then ran over the right side of the line for the score.
McCoy's side managed to overcome another error from Allen when he fumbled again in the third quarter, but he atoned for his earlier mistakes when he collected a short pass from Rivers to run in for a 32-yard touchdown.
St Louis kept the game alive late on when Hill found Stedman Bailey in the endzone for a touchdown to bring them within three points, and they forced the Chargers to punt on their next possession with time running out.
Austin returned the kick for a touchdown with an impressive 60-yard run, but the play was chalked off for a holding penalty. However, Hill fired his side to the goal line with a strike to Kenny Britt, but he then threw an interception to Gilchrist to hand the game to the home side.
