Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs scrambles with the ball against the Las Vegas Raiders during the second quarter at Allegiant Stadium on Oct. 4, 2026. (Photo by Steve Marcus/Getty Images)
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Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is unblemished at Allegiant Stadium.
(The Chiefs did lose there last year, but Mahomes didn’t play due to a knee injury.)
Following the 30-27 win there on Sunday, he is now 7-0 at the Las Vegas Raiders’ home stadium, including the overtime win in Super Bowl LVIII.
“It’s an awesome stadium,” Mahomes said. “I always take a lot of pride when I play here to play my best football.”
Of course, much of Mahomes’ success at Allegiant is due to the disparate levels of winning between the AFC West rivals.
Since the Chiefs won their first Super Bowl in the Mahomes era in 2019, the Raiders have had just one winning record.
But that could be changing.
Although the end result on Oct. 4 was the same, the Raiders, who entered the game tied for the AFC West lead with the Chiefs, seem like a different bunch this year — and perhaps one that could make the historic rivalry more competitive than it’s been of late.
“When there’s two good teams, that helps,” Chiefs head coach Andy Reid said. “Klint’s done a nice job.”
New head coach Klint Kubiak even had his team leading at the start of the fourth quarter.
But at the end of the third quarter, Chiefs running back Kenneth Walker completely changed the game.
Walker’s Impact
With the Chiefs in a three-tight end set, Walker ran between right guard Trey Smith and right tackle Jaylon Moore for 76 yards.
“We were able to bust that out,” Reid said.
Walker is looking like the best NFL investment of the offseason.
The Chiefs signed him to a three-year, $43.05 million contract worth $14.35 million a year, and he entered Sunday’s game leading the NFL in rushing and has been a master at breaking tackles.
To ice the game, Walker ran for a 22-yard touchdown, following Jeffrey Bassa’s forced fumble, which Reid called the biggest play of the game, on a kickoff return.
So it was Walker rather than his fellow Super Bowl MVP Mahomes who was most responsible for the latest win.
Mahomes completed just half of his passes for 225 yards but threw two touchdowns to Tyquan Thornton.
The wide receiver, who the Chiefs signed to a two-year, $11 million contract this offseason, had 111 yards but was carted off with a foot injury late in the fourth quarter.
In addition to Thornton’s big plays, the Chiefs’ running game was cooking for nearly 200 yards, but they held the Raiders to just 72 on 2.8 yards per carry.
Arrowhead West
As he entered the coaches’ elevator following the Chiefs victory, former Chiefs wide receiver and current radio analyst for the team, Danan Hughes referred to Allegiant as “Arrowhead West.”
It’s a moniker that really gained steam during the Chiefs’ win at the Raiders home in Super Bowl LVIII against the San Francisco 49ers.
Allegiant was very loud — ear-splitting at times — and represented a definite home-field advantage for the Raiders on Sunday, though Chiefs fans still represented themselves well.
A loud tomahawk chop chant broke out in the crowd after the Chiefs took a 17-13, fourth-quarter lead and exploded after Thornton’s 55-yard reception against a Raiders defense deploying a Cover-0 look.
“Chiefs Kingdom travels well,” Mahomes said.
The Chiefs’ presence in Allegiant has even taken on mythical proportions.
In a Jimmy Hoffa-esque fable, a since-refuted story reported that Gerard DeCosta, a Chiefs fan who was part of the stadium’s construction crew, buried a Chiefs flag under Allegiant during its construction.
What is true that the Chiefs take their colors seriously.
Chris Jones revealed that the Chiefs don’t wear black cleats because that color is associated with the Silver & Black.
But perhaps the colors most identified with Sunday’s physical contest, in which the Chiefs prevailed once again, were black and blue.
“A hard-fought battle against a good football team,” Reid said.
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