The Miami Dolphins have had two games without a punt or a turnover, and Tua Tagovailoa has been the quarterback for both.

On Sunday, the Dolphins defeated the Las Vegas Raiders 34-19 as Tagovailoa completed 28-of-36 passes for 288 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions.

On Nov. 13, 2022, Miami defeated the Cleveland Browns 39-17 as Tagovailoa completed 25-of-32 passes for 285 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions.

“Free money for him,” Tagovailoa said of Dolphins punter Jake Bailey on Sunday. “Good for him. It’s great for him. We took a picture, had zero punts. Happy for him.

“You know, it should signify that, for the most part, things are going well offensively.”

Tagovailoa’s third touchdown pass against the Raiders went for 57 yards to tight end Jonnu Smith. It came with 3:19 left to play – 64 seconds after Las Vegas had cut the Dolphins’ lead to five points at 24-19.

“I think for Jonnu that was a feel-space kind of play because essentially that wasn’t what we called for that play to be,” Tagovailoa said. “I think he just felt space and was like, ‘If I break it in, I could run into this guy over here,’ and he kind of just throttled going forward and was just like, ‘Yo, I’m over here.’”

The former Alabama All-American started the scoring with a 1-yard pass to Smith to cap a 14-play, 70-yard drive with 6:47 remaining in the first quarter. The TD came on a fourth-down snap. Miami went 2-of-2 on fourth down and 8-of-12 on third down in the game.

The Dolphins also used 14 plays to get their second touchdown – this time covering 97 yards to an 8-yard TD pass to wide receiver Tyreek Hill.

The Miami offense had seven possessions, which ended with four touchdowns, two field goals and the first-half whistle. One of the field-goal series lasted 16 plays.

“He’s taken a gigantic step in his game,” Miami coach Mike McDaniel said about Tagovailoa. “He’s got control of the emotional piece of the football game. He isn’t trying to force things necessarily, isn’t trying to make plays when they’re not there, but also finding ways to extend plays and making more plays than maybe the play that I gave him enabled him to do.”

Miami improved to 4-6 with its second straight victory as the Dolphins try to overcome the four-game stretch that Tagovailoa missed with a concussion. Miami went 1-3 and scored three touchdowns in those games.

Of the five games that Tagovailoa has played to completion this season, the Dolphins have won three with the losses coming on opposition field goals with five and no seconds left to play.

Miami plays the New England Patriots at noon CST Sunday at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts.

New England dropped to 3-8 with a 28-22 loss to the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday. The Dolphins defeated the Patriots 15-10 on Oct. 6 while Tagovailoa was sidelined.

“I would say anytime you can get a win in the NFL, it’s always a momentum builder for your team, for your locker room, for the organization,” Tagovailoa said. “It always feels better when your body’s hurting after a win than a loss, so I would say we’re looking forward to New England next week. We’re going to enjoy this game and move forward.”

Since he returned from injured reserve, Tagovailoa has completed 101-of-130 passes for 960 yards with seven touchdowns and one interception.

It’s the ninth four-game span in the NFL’s AFC/NFC era in which as player has throw 130 or more passes and completed at least 77.7 percent of them. Of the previous eight instances, Drew Brees did it three times, Peyton Manning twice and Matthew Stafford, Philip Rivers and Sam Bradford once apiece.

“I think what’s been different with the quarterback play is now not trying to force things down the field if it’s not there,” Tagovailoa said. “Taking the checkdowns, allowing our runners in space to go get first downs. Hopefully, they can break a tackle. You can use that also as essentially a run play, if you look at it in that sense. We like our matchups with our guys in space, so that’s what I would attest to today’s performance for us offensively.”

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.