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BALTIMORE -- The Baltimore Ravens' final offensive play in Sunday’s 17-15 loss to the Indianapolis Colts was awkward from the start.

Baltimore was threatening to take the lead with third-and-7 on the Colts' 14-yard line with 2:49 left in the game. But the Ravens were hurried at the line of scrimmage.

Baltimore had to decide whether to be conservative and run the football to set up a game-winning field goal, or pass to try for a first down or touchdown. Baltimore chose the aggressive play, but the Colts were prepared. Linebacker Gary Brackett made an interception covering Ravens tailback Ray Rice to seal the win for Indianapolis.

"I didn’t really think the guy that intercepted it was going to drop out the way he did," a surprised Flacco said. "It was a bad job by me. I might have been able to get Kelley [Washington] on the outside. I kind of rushed to get the ball snapped and made a bad decision."

The play was the final example of Baltimore continually being one step behind the Colts in the red zone Sunday. The Colts took the cliché of "bend but don’t break" to new levels in holding the Ravens to five field goals, despite Baltimore having no issues driving the football in between the 20s and putting up 354 total yards.

The Ravens were 0 for 4 in trips to the red zone, highlighted by Flacco's pick and three failed attempts to run the football from the Colts' 1 in the fourth quarter. Better execution in any of those four scenarios could have knocked the Colts (10-0) from the undefeated ranks and given the Ravens a marquee win that was sorely needed.

"We have to find a way to score touchdowns," Ravens offensive coordinator Cam Cameron said. "You can't attempt six field goals in a game like this, or potentially seven. You can’t do that."

Resorting to field goals against Peyton Manning will almost always result in a loss.

Manning (299 yards, one touchdown, two interceptions) had his issues with the Ravens' defense. But he was still able to orchestrate two masterful touchdown drives of 87 and 80 yards that made the difference.

According to ESPN’s Stats & Information, Manning was 5-of-7 with a touchdown and a 117.3 passer rating in the red zone against the Ravens. It was a stark contrast to Baltimore’s offensive production close to the goal line.

"We scored touchdowns, they scored field goals," Manning said. "That was kind of the difference."

Adding to Baltimore’s plight was its inability to break off big runs. The Ravens rushed for 98 yards on 31 carries (3.2 yard average) and their longest run was 16 yards.

Baltimore got most of its yards through the air. Flacco threw for 256 yards and receiver Derrick Mason was the biggest target with nine receptions for 142 yards.

But the Colts tightened up in the red zone as the Ravens became easier to defend. Baltimore couldn't get many yards on the ground and the short field limited the team's options in the passing game.

"They’re not the No. 1 scoring defense in the NFL by accident at this stage," Cameron said of Indianapolis. "You have to give them some credit. We can execute better and I can do better."

The loss puts Baltimore’s playoff hopes on thin ice.

With six games to go, the Ravens (5-5) trail the Pittsburgh Steelers (6-4), Jacksonville Jaguars (6-4), Denver Broncos (6-4) and Houston Texans (5-4) in a crowded field for the AFC wild-card. It appears 10 wins could be the magic number this season, which means the Ravens would have to win at least five of their last six games.

It starts with a huge AFC North showdown next week against the Steelers. Both teams are coming off tough losses and still have to meet twice this season. Those games probably will determine the playoff fates of each club.

"That’s a tough loss and it will be tough to swallow, but you’ve got to move on," Ravens defensive lineman Dwan Edwards said. "You got Pittsburgh [next], and that’s a division rival and you need to try to get the 'W.' That’s all we can do."

Mason was blunt about Baltimore's prospects moving forward.

"We all understand what needs to happen now, we do," Mason said. "You can’t get in the playoffs unless you win 10 games or more, and 10 games don’t automatically put you in in the AFC.

"So we know the road ahead of us. We have to win every game from here on out, point blank."

BALTIMORE -- The Colts pride themselves on plugging people into holes with no drop-off. They expect that when mistakes are made, they will find a way to overcome them.

Sunday at M&T Bank Stadium, as they improved to 10-0 with a 17-15 win over the Ravens, second-year tight end Tom Santi came to symbolize both themes.

The Colts were without Gijon Robinson, a starter who does a lot of blocking in the shadow of Dallas Clark, helping keep Peyton Manning clean and create room for Joseph Addai and Donald Brown. While he was in Indianapolis recovering from a concussion, Santi got the call.

Santi proved himself a capable blocker and a largely reliable target for Manning, chipping in with six catches for 80 yards.

He also had three costly plays -- a lost fumble near the goal line, an apparent alligator-arms moment in another scoring chance and a false start penalty.

“Everybody makes mistakes. You’ve got to watch, how do they handle it afterwards?” Addai said. “He was able to handle it afterwards. He hasn’t been playing a lot. This game he did a lot of good things. Yeah, he fumbled. But you’ve got to kind of let that go. I know he’ll learn from it, but move on. He did a great job for us today and I know he’ll improve from there.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Reggie Wayne said of the positive contribution. “He does it every day in practice. So now he just turned it over to the game. I think he did a pretty good job, minus the fumble. But that happens. I’m just glad it didn’t cost us.”

The Colts don’t so much plan to feature a guy as they allow Manning to take what’s available.

Robinson isn’t generally a large piece of the passing offense. Santi had a sense in the middle of the week that he’d be in line for a good share of the work that usually goes to Robinson.

Clark made a spectacular one-handed catch in the back of the end zone for a 3-yard touchdown to cap the game’s opening drive. Other than that, Baltimore did things defensively that prompted Manning to look elsewhere, and he turned to Santi for four of his 12 first-half completions.

“We saw some things, and obviously the quarterback is pretty good back there and he does a great job putting us in great position,” Santi said.

Down 9-7 in the second quarter, Manning placed a pass to Santi over the middle and in the middle of a crowd for a 22-yard gain. Santi got nailed, suffering a neck injury that briefly forced him from the game. It was a key play on a touchdown drive that put Indianapolis ahead 14-9.

On a day when he made his first catch of the season, he might have also scored his first touchdown of the year.

Instead, he ended the Colts’ first possession after the half when he was clobbered at the 1-yard line, hit low by Ed Reed and then high by Ray Lewis, who jarred the ball free for Dwan Edwards to recover.

Just about anyone might have coughed it up when scrunched by two eventual Hall of Famers.

Santi didn’t know who the defenders were.

"That’s a bad play on my part," he said. "I definitely left points out there. As far as I am concerned, that’s unacceptable."

The Colts' defense didn’t allow it to translate into points. While Baltimore moved 84 yards on the ensuing possession, Billy Cundiff missed a 30-yard field goal wide right.

Later, with Dawan Landry closing fast, Santi seemed tentative on a ball he could have pursued more aggressively on a second-and-goal from the 7. Just before the 2-minute warning, he was whistled for a false start.

He said both errors were a matter of lost focus. On the pass, he needs to come out of the break faster and be ready for it quicker.

“I definitely left some plays out there,” he said. “As you can see we’ve got a good team with a lot of great veteran leadership and that’s what we’ve talked about the whole year. Play the next play, next man up and when it’s your time, go out there and perform.”

He will enjoy the win, review the film, then shred it, mentally, as he knows his coaches will.

Then, if still needed, he will plug back in to the next-man-up, play-the-next-play philosophies that are a big part of why the Colts are the AFC’s lone undefeated club.

He’ll simply look to be the kind of player Wayne says all of the Colts are supposed to be.

“We’re like machines,” Wayne said. “They program us to keep pushing, don’t fall. Keep chugging away, chugging away. There is no time to point fingers or put your head down. Just keep going, keep going and find a way to get it done.”

BALTIMORE -- A lot of times, too much is made about a player returning to his old town to face his old team. In many, many instances in the NFL, these guys are mercenaries.

Certainly there are exceptions. Matt Stover's return to Baltimore as a member of the Colts was one of them.

In a 17-15 game, he hit the winning field goal against the franchise he played 17 seasons for, 12 of them in Baltimore.

“It was surreal, but I think everybody can understand that I tried my best to not internalize the fact that I am actually at Baltimore’s stadium,” he said. “So for that three hours, I compartmentalized my team, I did everything I could to erase it. Now of course there were time I was thinking, ‘Look at those guys over there, I am usually over there…’”

“Mind you I didn’t want them to win today, but I do want them to win… And I don’t want Baltimore to forget this: I’m part of the community and always will be.”

Had the Colts not signed him to fill-in for the injured Adam Vinatieri Oct. 14, Stover easily could have been with the Ravens again as they gave up on Steven Hauschka. With Stover off the market, they went with Billy Cundiff, who hit five field goals but missed a 30-yarder wide right.

After the Colts moved to 10-0 and players spilled out of the locker rooms in the tunnels below M&T Bank Stadium, Stover bumped into John Harbaugh, the coach who was part of the decision not to bring him back this season as the team went younger and looked for a bigger leg.

“Sorry about that kick he missed,” Stover told Harbaugh about Cundiff. “He kicked the ball great.”

BALTIMORE -- The Baltimore Ravens came extremely close to knocking the Indianapolis Colts from the undefeated ranks. But in the process of coming up short, Baltimore's playoff hopes are now in serious jeopardy.

Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco threw a crucial interception deep in Indianapolis territory with under three minutes to go to help the Colts seal a hard-fought, 17-15, victory at M&T Bank Stadium.

The usually cool Flacco came off the field and screamed in frustration after making arguably his worst decision of the season. Baltimore played a great game defensively against Peyton Manning and the high-powered Colts, as the Ravens were in prime position to take the lead late in the game.

Baltimore struggled mightily in the red zone as new kicker Billy Cundiff converted on five field goals. A touchdown on any of those opportunities could have changed the outcome for the Ravens. Cundiff also missed a sixth attempt.

Instead, Baltimore is 5-5 and likely will need to win five of its final six games to have a legitimate chance at the postseason. The Ravens will play the Pittsburgh Steelers, their biggest rival, next week at home in what is shaping up to be a must-win situation for Baltimore.

BALTIMORE -- And so concludes a full month of less-than-stellar play from the Indianapolis Colts.

I think it’s a bad thing for the rest of the NFL that the Colts have managed a 4-0 record over those four weeks.

In many ways, they were outplayed Sunday at M&T Bank Stadium. Just like after narrow wins over San Francisco, Houston and New England, there are issues that will show up in meeting rooms back at team headquarters, but not in the standings.

There, after a 17-15 win over the Ravens, things remain perfect at 10-0.

Peyton Manning threw two bad interceptions that kept the Ravens very much alive. But the Colts' defense repeatedly held up and forced field goal attempts. Three points at a time is rarely going to get it done against Indianapolis.

And as the Ravens appeared to be marching to points that would give them a late lead, Gary Brackett jumped in front of a short Joe Flacco pass over the middle aimed for Ray Rice.

The interception was Baltimore’s first give-away of the day and pretty much sewed up the result for the resilient, find-a-way Colts.

A butchered challenge by John Harbaugh -- he called a timeout, then lost a challenge, burning two clock stoppages on the same play -- and a silly attempt by Ed Reed to lateral a punt return at the very end accelerated the ending.

Next up, a rematch with the division rival Texans in Houston. The Colts will surely be watching what unfolds in Houston on Monday night when the Titans visit.

BALTIMORE -- Some halftime thoughts I imagine I’ll be expanding on later.

• The Ravens secondary gave up some monster plays on the Colts’ first drive. But it recovered nicely for two picks of Peyton Manning, who forced the first and didn’t look off Ed Reed on the second. Baltimore’s secondary was supposed to be a big issue here. It’s more than holding its own up to this point. But the offense needs to cash in with more than field goals.
• While we’re on secondary play -- the Colts don’t get enough credit for theirs, and it’s been very good. Even Tim Jennings, considered the weak link in the current group, had a nice break up of a Joe Flacco pass intended for Derrick Mason. A lot of hands on a lot of passes so far.
• Considering the Indy turnovers, the defense has to be happy about holding the Ravens to field goals. You always have to think that Manning and the Colts offense are going to take advantage of any team that settles too often for field goals. Baltimore has not been very aggressive on the plays just before Billy Cundiff’s been called on for field goals.
• Plug them in and play. Gijon Robinson stayed in Indy with a concussion. Tom Santi is not only blocking well in his place, he’s making big catches, too. Manning can make a lot of players look good, but the Colts have been developing depth behind Dallas Clark and Robinson for a while now with Santi and Jacob Tamme in the background. Santi, who has four catches for a game-high 61 yards, got popped on a big reception late in the first half and was hunched over on the sideline for a time but appears OK now.

BALTIMORE -- The Indianapolis Colts lead the Ravens, 14-12, at intermission.

Here are some halftime observations:

• Despite trailing, Baltimore has turned this into a Ravens type of game. Baltimore is forcing turnovers and shortening the game by pounding the football. Keeping it close doesn't put as much pressure on the Ravens' offense to air it out. It’s apparent early that Baltimore's goal is to limit Peyton Manning's possessions.
• Yes, the Ravens have struggled against the pass this season. But safety Dawan Landry is making big plays as of late. Landry got his second interception in as many weeks to set up a field goal by the Ravens. Landry got a pick-six against the Cleveland Browns last week.
• I’m a little surprised by some of Manning's poor decisions in the first half. Manning usually dominates Baltimore. But the Ravens have confused him on some coverages in the first half, making the Colts Pro Bowl quarterback either throw the ball away or throw an interception. There were also a couple of instances where Manning also was forced to use timeouts because he didn’t like what he saw at the line of scrimmage.
• Here is something I’ve never seen before: Ravens coach John Harbaugh challenged a catch by Colts receiver Reggie Wayne in the second quarter. After throwing the flag, Harbaugh watched the scoreboard and noticed Wayne got his feet in bounds. So the Ravens coach takes his flag back and rescinds his challenge. Interesting.