Streak on line for Chiefs

Kansas City travels to troubled Oakland Monday night

? It was easily the worst game the Kansas City Chiefs have played since Dick Vermeil became coach in 2001.

With Priest Holmes sidelined by a hip injury that eventually would require surgery, and playing in a pouring rain, Oakland put a 24-0 licking on Kansas City Dec. 28.

The Super Bowl-bound Raiders handed the Chiefs their first shutout in 139 games, rushing for 280 yards compared to just an embarrassing 44 for Kansas City.

But how quickly things do change. Monday night on the same field, the Chiefs (6-0) will be out to win their seventh in a row and remain unbeaten while the Raiders (2-4) will be out to save their season.

“Obviously, this is a huge week for us,” Oakland wide receiver Tim Brown said Monday. “They’ll come in here with pitchforks and shovels looking to bury us. We’ve got to fight tooth-and-nail to keep that from happening.”

It will be Vermeil’s first appearance on Monday night as a head coach since his Philadelphia Eagles played in Miami in 1981.

“We lost that game in a very, very tough, tight, intense football game,” Vermeil said.

Vermeil has nevertheless done a thorough study of what seems to lead to success on Monday nights.

“To make sure that the old coach doesn’t mess it up,” he said. “And I think we have got a good plan, a good approach.”

One key will probably be an improved run defense. Although the Chiefs’ record is perfect, the team’s defense has not been.

The Raiders, who are averaging a shade under 90 yards a game on the ground, will be facing a defense that’s been giving up 132, which ranks 27th in the league.

A major problem against the Packers was the defensive line, which had one of its worst games and allowed Green Bay blockers to get out on the linebackers.

“There’s a special emphasis being made by my defensive coaches to improve the play of the defensive line. We’re too talented not to play better,” Vermeil said.

In an unusual first for the 66-year-old Vermeil, he’s also become the only coach to have three different teams start 6-0. In each case, in Philadelphia in 1982 and St. Louis in 1999, his teams lost their seventh game. He knows as well as anyone that now is not the time to relax.

“What I do is I scrutinize more deeply, I evaluate tougher than I ever do. I am tougher on my coaches than I have been, and I will be tougher on my players than I have ever been,” he said.

“Does that mean I don’t respect what they have done? No, it just makes me better realize the potential of what we have the ability to maybe get done if we do keep getting better. We have got a lot invested to keep going toward what we have set out to do.”