CHARLOTTE, N.C. – After the Kansas City Chiefs earned their fifth walk-off win of the season on Sunday, quarterback Patrick Mahomes said he would get the wins any way he could, but they would prefer if they did at the end would be less stressful.

“You want to have some bursts,” Mahomes said after the Chiefs defeated the Carolina Panthers 30-27 on rookie Spencer Shrader’s 31-yard field goal as time expired. “You want to be a little calmer in the fourth quarter. I’ve always said that just knowing that you’ve been through those moments before and know how to attack it can be a good thing when you get to the playoffs and later in the season.

“But I would love to win a match (before) the very last match.”

The 10-1 Chiefs have recorded eight one-score wins, tying the most NFL record of any team through the first eleven games of a season. Half of their wins come from the last game. One of those wins was decided by a blocked field goal, one on an overtime touchdown, one when an opposing receiver failed to get a foot in the end zone and now two on field goals.

Mahomes led the Chiefs on the game-winning drive against the Panthers. It started with two short pass completions, but the big play was a 33-yard Mahomes scramble that put the Chiefs within field goal range.

Mahomes, by his own admission, isn’t the fastest or most elusive quarterback when he runs. But he is effective.

“He has a great feel for the game,” coach Andy Reid said. “He knows through the coverage where guys are and what they’re trying to do and accomplish with the coverage, and he can feel the front end.”

Mahomes has made some long runs for the Chiefs after some of their most notable wins. The longest play on their winning drive in Super Bowl LVII against the Philadelphia Eagles was a Mahomes 26-yard run, and the longest play on the winning drive in their Super Bowl LVIII victory against the San Francisco 49ers last season was a Mahomes run of 19 yards. walk.

“It’s not like I plan things like that in advance,” Mahomes said. “It’s just when it counts and you have to make the play, I feel like I’m going to go out there and make the play, and that’s why I feel like sometimes it happens a little bit later in games.

“You don’t want to slide. You have to put your body out there knowing you can take hits and things like that, but we were able to make some big runs and some big moments.”

Shrader joined the Chiefs two weeks ago as an emergency replacement for Harrison Butker, who had undergone surgery for a torn meniscus. Shrader kicked in two games, one for the Indianapolis Colts and one for the New York Jets, before joining the Chiefs in time for a game against the Buffalo Bills.

“I knew I was going to get an opportunity, so I tried to stay calm and understand that at some point that opportunity would present itself,” Shrader said. “When that opportunity came along, I was ready for it. That comes from believing in the team that they’re going to put you in that situation, and then you go out there and just get through it.”

Butker has made many a kick for the Chiefs, including their other walk-off field goal this season, a 51-yarder against the Cincinnati Bengals.

The Chiefs said they believed in Shrader but weren’t sure how he would respond in a pressure situation that isn’t new to this year’s Chiefs, but is new to him.

“That’s a lot of pressure for a rookie,” Reid said. “He’s now replacing a future Hall of Famer here for us. That’s not easy in these games.”