Just a grip of post-game quotes from the coaches and all the big players from Sunday’s 12-7 victory. Josh McDaniels, Marvin Lewis, Brandon Stokley, Kyle Orton, and Wesley Woodyard, among others, talk about the big game.

JOSH McDANIELS

Have you ever been associated with a play that crazy?

“No. I’ve seen it happen one time to my father, but we were on the good side of that one too. You just have to play as long as they’ll let you, and we did. Our guys kept fighting, obviously. We made one more play than they did today.”

Does the defense get credit for the win today?

“The defense played well. Our plan was solid. We wanted to stop the running game with six or seven guys up there and take away the big plays, which we did for the most part. I know we missed some tackles and gave up some big plays after catches. But I thought we disrupted (Carson Palmer’s) rhythm, and didn’t let him get going. Offensively, we didn’t do enough with the ball. At the end of the game, they had the ball for 33-34 minutes. We wore down a bit on that last drive. And give credit to the Bengals. They moved the ball down the field well at the end.”

Can you go through your emotions from beginning to end of that play?

“When we called what we called, we just wanted to give someone a chance. We were planning on using a timeout and taking a shot from there to get into field-goal range. It was right in front of me when that ball went up in the air. I knew that Brandon (Stokley) would catch it, but I didn’t know where everyone else was. Once he caught it, and there was only Dhani Jones to beat, I kept yelling, ‘Don’t get caught! Don’t get caught!’ because Stokley is not the fastest guy we have on the field. I was looking up at the scoreboard because I didn’t know if he needed to get out of bounds. I didn’t know if anyone else was coming at him at an angle. Once it was apparent that he was going to score, I turned back and scanned the field for a yellow hanky.”

Thoughts on Brandon Stokley using more clock before entering end zone …

“I think that’s the right call as long you’re safe. If he does that, and someone tackles him at the one, we would be talking about a completely different scenario. We talk so much to our players about being aware of the situation. We scored a field goal at the end of the half, and we scored during the final 10 seconds, which of course we didn’t script it like that. I think they understand that if you play hard, anything is possible. We didn’t turn the ball over and we were on the wrong end of the field position game, which obviously hurt our opportunities to score. It’s a win. This is the National Football League and I’m proud of those guys for playing hard for 60 minutes.”

Can you share the play call?

“It was ‘All Go,’ fittingly enough.”

Even though you were known as an offensive coach, your defensive experienced did have something to do with becoming head coach …

“Our defensive staff had a great plan. We went back and forth with some things this week, and used some things that were successful previously against this team. Again, this was that kind of game. They didn’t do a whole lot offensively either. For the most part, it was a field position game. And, it was a game about who could make the last play. Fortunately for us, we did. We have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of improvements to make. There were some good things and there is obviously stuff we need to work on.”

What was the situation with the clock at the end of the game?

“It was an odd situation. They had called a timeout. Then the upstairs decided to review whether he scored or not. When they came back out and said he didn’t score, they didn’t tell me they were going to wind the clock. They made the decision to give them their timeout back and then start the clock. I was watching the clock and it never started. So I didn’t call our timeout, but I would have. Ultimately, what ended up happening because it was a replay challenge, they put the time back on the clock and then charged them with a timeout. They did a good job of trying to iron it out and make sure that they got it right.”

Do you have to get more out of your quarterback?

“We have to get more out of a lot of people. It isn’t just about the quarterback. The quarterback did some good things today and we missed a few opportunities. There are a lot of people who are going to have to play better. We know that. That team in there knows that. It’s week one, and you build off of your performances as the season goes on. We are not naive to that and we know we have to get back to work tomorrow.”

Thoughts on Brandon Marshall …

“I thought he played well. He made some plays and made a big third-down catch on that one drive. He really got into a rhythm. It was hot and humid and we needed all of our guys today. We had some guys get dinged during the course of the game. I think all of our receivers did a great job with the opportunities that they had.”

Thoughts on injury to Spencer Larsen …

“I’m not exactly sure what happened, but it happened here. It was kind of a fluke accident. I’m going to be updated on it here in a minute. It happened here in the locker room before the game.”

Thoughts on being the ninth Broncos head coach to win his opener …

“It feels great. To share that with the guys in the locker room, coaches, ownership and the organization, that’s the fun part. This isn’t how we drew it up, but when you win one, you win one. It’s the first one for our team and for a bunch of new guys in there. I’m proud of them. It feels great to be 1-0. We know that there will only be 16 teams like that after week one and we’re proud to be one of them.”

Can you describe the crazy play that your father was a part of?

“There was two minutes to go with a four- or five-point deficit. The ball was downed on the one-yard line. Through a slant pattern, the wide receiver caught it and ran 99 yards for a touchdown. I remember the same kind of feeling because of how long the play was. That play took the game clock all the way down to 10 seconds. It took a long time, and it felt like it did. It was similar as far as unusual circumstances.”

BRANDON STOKLEY

Take us through the game-winning play …

“It was an ‘all-go’ play — everyone was going vertical. At that point, you are just trying to catch a break. You hope to catch a ball, call a timeout and have another chance to get around the 40 and give Prater a chance to make another field goal. Everybody (on the defense) just went to Marshall. I don’t know if he tipped it or what, but I was just in the right place at the right time.”

Where were you going with your route initially?

“I was just going up the inside edge of the numbers, and I knew they were going to play a really soft Cover 2. It is tough to complete a long pass against that coverage.”

When you caught it were you thinking about getting out of bounds?

“I had so much go through my head. I didn’t know if someone was behind me. I thought, ‘Just get as much as you can.’ Then I started thinking about getting caught inbounds. I forgot if we had any timeouts left. Then when I got around the goal line, I saw one of their players pull up, and I just decided to waste some time.”

How did you know if someone was behind you? Did you look up at the scoreboard?

“No, I didn’t do the (scoreboard). I am just fast (joking). I didn’t know who it was (behind me), but I could tell that I was pulling away, so when I got around the goal line, I decided to waste some time.”

How do you have the presence of mind to waste time?

“My mind was just racing with what I should do when I got the ball. Should I head towards the sidelines and get out of bounds? Then I felt myself pulling away from the guy behind me, so I just decided to go for it all.”

A lot of attention went to the play that won it, but would you give this one to the defense?

“The defense played great. They kept us in there, especially in the first half. We couldn’t get a first down at all. We put them in the short field and the defense kept making plays for us. Then we got a little momentum right before the half, and that was big for us. We started getting some things going in the second half a little bit better. We just have to finish off drives and hopefully do better this week.”

Where does this rank for you in terms of great moments?

“You can’t really rank it with the playoffs or the Super Bowl. But as far as the regular season, it ranks at the top. To be the season opener, you always want to get off to a good start. I think regular-season wise, this is tops in my career.”

What does this mean for this team after a tough offseason?

“It’s big. You always want to get off to a good start. We did have a lot of change, but that’s the way it goes in the NFL. We know what we have in that room, and we are just going to keep chugging away and trying to improve.”

When Cincinnati scored late, what were you thinking?

“You know that you need a miracle at that point. You are hoping to get a good kickoff return, and when that doesn’t happen, you need a miracle, and basically that’s what we got. It was frustrating, because we had a chance to put it away with a field goal on our second to last drive, and we didn’t take advantage.”

KYLE ORTON

What was going through your mind on the game-winning play?

“We obviously weren’t moving the ball great and had quite a few three and outs. We weren’t in rhythm, but we didn’t do anything to beat ourselves. We didn’t turn the ball over and had the field goal just before the half to go up 3-0. We came into halftime and were feeling pretty good about ourselves. We didn’t play that well and we didn’t execute that well, but we were still up by three. We just kept battling, didn’t beat ourselves, and the defense was great, obviously. Offensively, I would say the only stupid thing we did was knocking ourselves out of field goal range on our second to last drive.”

How was your finger throughout the game?

“It felt all right. I am hoping to have this behind me now and be glove-free next week. I didn’t have any setbacks today, which is important.”

Where does this rank in terms of bizarre finishes in your career?

“I was on the other side of a situation like this last year. We were playing Atlanta and we scored what we thought was a game-winning touchdown with 12 seconds to go, but we ended up getting beat in the last 12 seconds. I know how that felt, and I know how this feels, and this is a whole lot better. This is a great way for this team to start the season off. A lot of people have questioned us, but we feel that we are a good football team. We have a lot of improvements to make offensively, but we are going to work hard and try to play better next week.”

Can you take us through what you saw on that last play?

“It was just like the first play, I was trying to hit Brandon Marshall on the sidelines. I didn’t think we were going to score a touchdown, but I thought we still had a chance with one timeout left. We were trying to eat up big chunks of yardage. I saw the ball go straight up in the air and Stokley right underneath, and he just took off running.”

Did you ever think about the chance of an interception on that play?

“I wasn’t even worried about an interception in that situation. I want to give my player a chance to make a play. I thought the first play on the drive was a pick anyway and the game was over. But you have your hands tied in that situation.”

It seems like you’ve won a lot of games in your career that aren’t necessarily pretty …

“I think you win a lot of games in the NFL when you win the turnover margin, and that’s what we did as an offense. We didn’t turn the ball over, and didn’t really have any penalties until the next to last drive. If you can play smart football, have more possessions than the other team and stay penalty-free, you have a chance to win a lot of games.”

EDDIE ROYAL

What do you carry with you following today’s game?

“You have to play every game to the end. The ball bounced in our favor today.”

Talk about the Broncos offense’s performance today …

“You’ve got to give a lot of credit to our team’s defense. We know the offense has some things to work on now. Our defense hung in there and kept fighting today. You’ve got to give the defense a lot of credit for the win today.”

Talk about coming out of this game with a win …

“It was a hard-fought game. We knew this game was going to be won in the fourth quarter. This is why we were working so hard in training camp and OTAs. It came down to one of the last plays in the fourth quarter and (Brandon) Stokely came down with it.”

Talk about some of the dropped passes in today’s game …

“It’s something to work on in the first game. There are going to be things that we have to work on after the first game. We know what those things are and we have to get better.”

How does it feel to be 1-0?

“Winning is a great feeling. You learn to appreciate it. Especially after a game like this. We want to go home with a win and represent Denver and the Broncos the right way.”

CORRELL BUCKHALTER

Have you ever been a part of a win quite like today’s?

“I’ve seen some things in football, but never anything quite like this.”

Is it hard to not give up when the clock is winding down and you are losing on the scoreboard?

“Coach (Josh) McDaniels is always talking about playing 60 minutes of football. We had 38 seconds left when they kicked it off to us. You’ve got to play 60 minutes, because anything can happen in this league.”

What did you see on the touchdown play from Orton to Stokley?

“I saw players not giving up when we had an opportunity to make a play. Kyle (Orton) gave Brandon (Marshall) a chance and he tipped it to (Brandon) Stokley and you saw the results.”

What did think of Stokley’s delayed crossing of the goal line?

“That was a veteran move. I think he knew what he was doing.”

Talk about the performance of the Broncos’ defense against the Bengals …

“My hat’s off to the defense today. We need to do a better job of keeping them off the field. They were on the field a lot and they held the Bengals to seven points.”

WESLEY WOODYARD

Talk about how your performance today …

“My teammates gave me respect and believed in my abilities and I tried to go out and show what I could do.”

Talk about the offseason changes of this team and what’s it been like for you and this team?

“It was different at first. Nobody knew what to believe, but we’ve got to keep faith. We believe in Coach McDaniels now, and we’ve got to go out and do what we can to win games.”

ELVIS DUMERVIL

Did the Broncos defense keeping the team in the game?

“That’s what it was today. It’s not a one-sided game. It’s offense, defense and special teams. It takes all three parts to win. Sometimes we need each other. There are going to be games where we need the offense to carry the defense. They scored the touchdown when it counted at the end today. I think we did some great things, but there are some things we need to clean up as well.

What did you see in your first regular-season game in the 3-4 defense …

“I think we did some good things. I need to watch the film, but I know we tried to play tough today. I’m sure we made some errors, but the important thing is that we came out with a victory.”

CINCINNATI BENGALS

MARVIN LEWIS

Initial comments …

“Obviously that is not the finish to a football game that you want to have. I told the guys that (when) we have an opportunity to win the football game right there, we’ve got to find a way to get the ball batted to the ground or make the tackle over the top. It’s a disappointing way to lose. We played our butts off throughout the game — we kept battling — but we just didn’t make plays to win. We shot ourselves in the foot numerous times offensively. Other than the drive right before halftime and the one pass play, those were their (the Broncos’) two major plays against our defense. That doesn’t matter; we lost the football game. We just didn’t make enough plays to win it.”

Is there a way that you are “supposed” to make a play like the last one of the game?

“Well, you want to have proper body positioning and block the ball. It was just the luck of the draw this time.”

What do you say to your players after something like this has happened?

“We didn’t do enough things correctly when the ball came to us. By 4 o’clock tomorrow we need to come out a better football team than we are. That means playing with poise throughout all the adverse situations that occur in a game.”

Was that play a test of the team’s maturity?

“No, I don’t think it was a test. I believe it was a proving factor because it’s something that we need to come out of and build on. You battle out there in a tight football game and don’t make plays in the first half to score points, things just don’t go the way you want them to.”

You say they gave up that play. Can you honestly say they technically did something wrong on that play?

“Well you don’t want to have (an 87-yard) pass play. In that situation, you have to understand that the main thing is to make the tackle. You want to play deep. You do everything you can do to make the tackle and go from there. We’ve got one time out left … call time out, now you’ve earned yourself 20 seconds, you make another tackle and then the game is over. You’re basically two tackles from winning the football game at that point. You don’t get situations like this in practice to prepare for, but we got it today unfortunately and didn’t execute it.”

What was the discussion before the kick off?

“They said that replay didn’t stop it and that they were stopping it for my time out as opposed to stopping it for replay. Initially they said replay would stop it, but since they didn’t change the challenge on replay, they had to come back to me calling time out, which turned out to be irrelevant.”

Were the looks for Chris Henry not there today?

“I think one ball and one catch is a pretty good day. You can’t tell who is going to get the ball thrown to them. They’re playing the coverage and the quarterback is going to deliver the ball based on the coverage. You aren’t going to be able to dictate the number of balls a receiver is going to catch in a day.”

You say you expected more from your offense …

“I expected them to score points. We had some very good running plays, but we set ourselves back a few times with the linemen downfield on plays, Chad (Ochocinco) had the holding penalty and he had the interference penalty. Obviously, we hurt ourselves. We had those two things today, and we sometimes didn’t handle the safety pressures very good. We got overrun one time, and another time we didn’t make the look. These things got us off balance and knocked us out of sync when we were driving. (The Broncos) did a good job executing and we didn’t. We hit some things against their blitzes and made a lot of plays, but we’ve got to be more consistent.”

CARSON PALMER

Quarterback

Could you believe what you were seeing on that last touchdown pass?

“I have never seen anything like that. I’ve been playing football since I was seven or eight years old. I’ve seen a Hail Mary caught in the end zone, but that was just a little bit different than a Hail Mary. It was an unbelievable play them.”

Can words describe how you guys were feeling in the locker room after the game?

“Nope. Disgust, offensively. Our defense played so well, and kept us in the game. I don’t think they had a first down until the end of the first half. I am excited to see our defense play that well. I was happy to see them come out like that and just dominate the game. But we have to find a way to score points on offense, and we will. It’s disheartening. It’s Sunday, and on Monday we have to come in with our heads up. We are 0-1, and we still have 15-plus games to play. That’s the positive. We fought, and we scored when we had to in the end. Obviously, we have to score more points than that. There are some positives in such a deflating atmosphere. It was such a sad ending.”

What were the problems on offense?

“A number of things. We had a lot of penalties that hurt us. We had some mental errors. We had some really good plays. We had certain players make really good plays. We moved the ball effectively, but just not into the end zone. That’s something we have to figure out. We’ll go back and look at the film and find out what was happening with the penalties. It’s always hard to tell until you go back and look at the film and talk to guys to figure out why one thing happened or another. That’ll clear things up for us a little and we will iron it out. We will move on and move on to Green Bay.”

How is it that the offense can go all game without moving the ball, and then in the last three minutes, drive the ball down the field and score?

“I wish I knew. If I knew, we would have scored more points. If I knew the answer to the quick fix, we would have scored points in the first quarter, the second quarter and the third quarter. It’s unacceptable, and I’ll take the heat on my shoulders. It’s my job as the quarterback to move the ball and get the ball in the end zone. I didn’t do that today. Like I said before, when our defense plays that well, it makes the loss even harder. Knowing that you didn’t do your job offensively, it’s embarrassing. I’ll take the heat for that, because I need to find a way to get us in the end zone, and I will.”

Chris Henry had a good preseason, and he was a non factor in this game. Why was that?

“They weren’t going to let the ball go over their heads. They played two deep safeties — as deep as a safety that I’ve ever seen. Their mind set was to not let us throw the ball downfield. We tried to a number of times, but you just can’t force it. We had Chris on a number of deep routes, but if he’s double covered … You have to take your shots when the shots are there. You can’t take shots just to take shots. They came with that mindset, and they did a good job. They have two really good cover corners and an experienced safety in (Brian) Dawkins. They lined up 25 yards deep and started backpedaling. They weren’t going to let the ball go over their heads. They wanted to keep the ball in front of them, and they did a good job of that.”

Was it surprising to see Laveranues Coles struggle as much as he did?

“Yes. But, I don’t have a worry in the world about Laveranues. He dropped the ball, but I missed plenty of balls, we missed blocks — a number of things happened offensively. Knowing Laveranues, and knowing the type of pro he is, he’ll come in with the right type of mindset and shake it off. You won’t see that from him again.”

Was there something different that their defense was doing up until the second half?

“They had a different game plan in the second half. In the first half, they were going to sit back and play us in coverage. In the second half they started bringing the pressure. They did a good job. We made some adjustments at halftime and they countered us. Late in the game, they tried to keep doing it, and we made them pay with some hot routes — getting our running backs out in space and getting some yards.”

Did it take some time to get the rust off since you didn’t play much in the preseason?

“It took a little bit to get the rust off. I wasn’t exactly comfortable, but I didn’t expect to be. I knew I was going to have some butterflies and some rust with some foot issues. It took a little while to get those out.”

Was there anything special said in the huddle before the last drive?

“No. Just, let’s go down and score. Nothing needs to be said. Everybody knew. It’s a 6-0 game, and seven points wins it. Nothing needed to be said. We have a good group of professional guys that knew what their job was. Everybody did their job and we drove down and scored.”

Based on the way the offense played all day, what did that last drive do to the confidence of the offense?

“It was definitely a little bit of a boost. We were talking all game about how we were shooting ourselves in the foot. We were moving the ball, and we were effective on offense. We just kept getting little penalties that would push us back to second-and-10 with a holding call, or an illegal man downfield. We knew what the problem was — the problem was us. It took us too long to get it fixed.”

KEVIN HUBER

Punter

Talk about the field goal. It was a difficult snap to handle, but what do you think when you look back at it?

“I should have caught the ball. I took my eyes off too soon and the ball got passed me. I can’t have that happen. It’s on me.”

Five of your punts went inside the 20-yard line. Second most in team history …

“That’s my job. The coverage team did a great job getting down the field and kept the return team in check.”

BOBBIE WILLIAMS

Guard

Do you think Carson Palmer was rusty because he didn’t play preseason?

“No, there wasn’t any rust. There were a lot of good plays, but we shot ourselves in the foot. I was penalized for being downfield. You can’t do that in this league, regardless of who you’re playing.”

We’ve talked about this team learning how to finish and once again, you were right there, but didn’t …

“Who could ever predict that a tipped ball would be run in for a TD? You play until the clock expires. We took the lead, but the game wasn’t over until the clock is out, and this was a prime example why.”

How much does this one hurt?

“It hurts. To have it taken away on a play like that is bothersome. You have to learn from it.”

LEON HALL

Cornerback

Do you think you could have knocked the ball down?

“Yeah. I should have knocked it down or picked it off.”

Did you even see Brandon Stokely?

“At the last minute. I was turned over.”

The defense played very well …

“We played well. It’s just unfortunate the game has to end like that”

DOMATA PEKO

Defensive tackle

How do you think the defense played?

“I think we played solid. We have to clean up some of the small things, but overall, I think we played well.”

To have a game end like that must be rough …

“Yeah it is. It’s sickening. We’re going to recover from this. It’s a long season and this is only the first one. We’ve got to learn a lesson from this and move forward.”

How did you get so much pressure on Orton?

“That’s what we worked on during the offseason. We had a couple of sacks from the front four. We have to move forward and forget about this game and look forward to next week.”