Kansas City, Mo. ? Herm Edwards, who has been criticized for faulty clock management going all the way back to his days in New York, isn’t sitting still for this one.

Kansas City’s first-year coach has drawn fire from some fans and broadcasters for not using at least one of his three timeouts while Cleveland was driving late in the fourth quarter Sunday for the game-tying touchdown.

Why not stop the clock and give yourself more precious seconds to get downfield and maybe kick a game-winning field goal if the Browns do get the game tied?

But Edwards kept his timeouts in his pocket and the Chiefs had less than a minute to work with after Cleveland scored the tying touchdown in a game the Browns eventually won 31-28 in overtime.

“They have to make a decision in 30 seconds, and I’m not going to stop the clock so they can regroup and think about what they want to do,” he said. “They’ve got to score. We’re winning the game. We’re not losing the game. They have to score a touchdown. So for me, I’m sitting there going, ‘OK, if they do score, I’m going to have 30 seconds left, and I’ve got all three timeouts.”

It’s a strategy, Edwards pointed out, that worked beautifully in a 17-13 victory over Oakland on Nov. 19. The Raiders drove inside the 10 in the final seconds, but safety Jarrad Page intercepted Oakland’s pass in the end zone to preserve the win.

Similarly in a 30-27 victory Oct. 22 over San Diego, Lawrence Tynes kicked a game-winner with 6 seconds left after the Chiefs used timeouts while driving down the field to put him in position.

“We didn’t make a good play (in Cleveland) when we got the ball back. That hurt us,” Edwards said.

“Different situations dictate maybe you use (timeouts). I thought we managed it well,” he said. “I wasn’t raising the white flag thinking they were going to score a touchdown. I thought we were going to stop them. I’m not going to start calling timeouts under 2 minutes, and our defense looks at me and says, ‘What are you doing?’

“If I’m going to do that, I’m just going to let them score. Just let them run the ball and score a touchdown, get it over with. You don’t do that. You’ve got to play the game.”

The loss left the Chiefs (7-5) in a five-way tie for the two AFC wild-card spots, and also with a sour taste in their mouth. The defense, which had played well for a month, failed to get the win even though tight end Tony Gonzalez had over 100 yards receiving, running back Larry Johnson had over 100 yards rushing and Trent Green threw four touchdown passes.

In this way, the entire scene seemed disturbingly reminiscent of past seasons when the Chiefs would lead the league in offense but fail even to reach the playoffs because of their sorry defense.

It was also another late-season failure on the road, something else that has haunted Kansas City for six years.

“Why that is, I don’t have any idea,” Edwards said.