Patrick Mahomes passed for 320 yards and three touchdowns and the Kansas City Chiefs locked up the top seed in the AFC for the fourth time in seven seasons with a 29-10 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers on Wednesday.

The two-time defending Super Bowl champions raced to an early 13-point lead and were never really threatened by the Steelers (10-6), who have dropped three straight as their chances of capturing the AFC North took another hit.

Mahomes connected on first-half scoring tosses to Xavier Worthy and Justin Watson and Kansas City’s defense did most of the rest even with perennial All-Pro defensive end Chris Jones sitting out while nursing a calf injury. The Chiefs sacked Russell Wilson five times, forced two turnovers and hardly looked gassed while playing for the third time in 11 days.

Travis Kelce caught eight passes for 84 yards while becoming the third tight end in NFL history to reach 1,000 receptions, joining Hall of Famer Tony Gonzalez and Jason Witten. Kelce sealed Kansas City’s fifth straight victory with a 12-yard touchdown grab early in the fourth quarter.

The 35-year-old celebrated by dunking the ball over the goal post, which drew an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and groans from a capacity crowd at Acrisure Stadium that has grown used to seeing Mahomes toy with the hometown team. Mahomes is now 4-0 against the Steelers in his career, with 17 touchdowns against one interception.

Russell Wilson threw for 205 yards for Pittsburgh. George Pickens finished with three receptions for 50 yards after missing three games with a hamstring injury. It wasn’t nearly enough for the Steelers, who went 0-3 during a brutal three-game stretch against Super Bowl contenders Philadelphia, Baltimore and Kansas City.

Perhaps more troubling than the losses is the way they played out. The Steelers lost each game at least 14 points and could start the playoffs on the road after playing fast-and-loose with the two-game division lead they had just three weeks ago.

Mahomes, hardly bothered by the ankle injury he suffered against Cleveland, led the Chiefs to touchdowns on their first two drives, finding Worthy in the flat for a seven-yard score and hitting Watson in the back corner of the end zone to make it 13-0.

One sequence late in the first quarter symbolized a frustrating day for Pittsburgh. A holding penalty negated a short touchdown run by Jaylen Warren and Wilson threw into triple coverage in the end zone on the next snap. Kansas City’s Justin Reid had little trouble grabbing it to end the threat.

The Steelers drew within six twice at 13-7 and 16-10, but never had the ball with a chance to take the lead in the second half. Instead, the Chiefs – who spent most of the first three months of the season squeaking by most weeks – methodically pulled away.

Kareem Hunt ran over from 2 yards on the first snap of the fourth quarter to make it 22-10. Pat Freiermuth then fumbled on Pittsburgh’s next possession. Kansas City linebacker Nick Bolton fell on it and Mahomes needed just four plays to float a pass to a wide-open Kelce to put it out of reach.

NFL’s Netflix debut on Christmas kicks off without a glitch

Mariah Carey opened Wednesday’s double-header with a taped performance of All I Want for Christmas is You before Mahomes, Kelce and the Chiefs kicked off against the Steelers.

The Houston Texans will host the Baltimore Ravens in the second game as the NFL showcases four of the AFC’s top five teams.

Netflix agreed to a three-year contract in May to broadcast Christmas Day games. The streaming giant is expecting one of its biggest days since the site launched in 1998.

Netflix’s 282.3m subscribers in more than 190 countries can stream the games, marking the first time one outlet has distributed an NFL game globally. Netflix has the games available in five languages – English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and German.

Netflix had problems streaming the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight on 14 November. The bout peaked at 65m concurrent streams, including 38m concurrent streams in the United States. According to the website Down Detector, nearly 85,000 viewers logged problems with outages or streaming leading up to and during the fight.

There were no signs of trouble early Wednesday during the game after a couple of blunders during the pregame show. The broadcast opened with roughly 10 seconds of silence because it appeared studio host Kay Adams’ microphone wasn’t turned on.

The biggest test should come at halftime of the Ravens-Texans game when Beyoncé performs live at NRG Stadium.

According to NFL Media, viewers in all 50 states tuned in within minutes of the pregame show going live and viewers from nearly 200 countries watched the lead-in to kickoff.

The NFL is playing its first games on Wednesday since the Steelers and Ravens were forced to play on 2 December 2020, because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The only other time the league played on a Wednesday since 1948 was in 2012 when the Giants and Cowboys met in the season opener.