At the two-minute warning of the first half Sunday, the Minnesota Vikings faced a decision they’d faced each of the previous two games. Fourth and 1, deep in the opponent’s territory. What should Mike Zimmer do?
Against the Seattle Seahawks in Week 5, the Vikings ran it with Alexander Mattison. He was stopped.
Against the Atlanta Falcons in Week 6, they ran it with Mike Boone. He was stopped.
But Sunday they had a healthy Dalvin Cook, who’d been unavailable for those previous two attempts. With an extra offensive lineman on the field along with two tight ends, Cook burst off the left edge for three yards and a first down. Then he rushed it four more times in a row, ending in a touchdown.
The Vikings tied the game with that score and wouldn’t trail again. Zimmer had emphasized the importance all week of playing better in the quarters before and after halftime, and the Vikings responding by outscoring the Packers 21-7 in those two frames en route to a 28-22 win.
“That’s Coach Zim football right there,” Cook said after the game, wearing sunglasses during his Zoom interview.
Cook will get most of the headlines and probably an NFC Offensive Player of the Week honor for his 226 all-purpose yards and four touchdowns. His blockers up front, though, are as much the story as they wore down a Packers front that had made the Vikings miserable in their last three meetings — all Green Bay wins.
“It’s been the opposite for us all year,” Cook said. “In the first game of the year, they came out and controlled the time of possession by more than 20 minutes, I think. So it was the opposite for us.
“I was telling those guys all game how much of an impact it was having for me with what I was seeing,” Cook added. “They were doing a great job all day. Commend the offensive linemen for keeping Kirk off the ground pretty much the whole day and opening up the holes for the backs to run through.”
@vikings @dalvincook did it all for the #Vikings with a whole lotta help from his offensive line who played like a convoy of Minnesota Snow Plow’s #Skol #BaldysBreakdowns pic.twitter.com/SXjWcCzgy3
— Brian Baldinger (@BaldyNFL) November 2, 2020
It’s hard to say who provided the energy boost: Cook to the offensive line or vice versa. Both sides were quick to praise each other in the aftermath of the Vikings win. Center Garrett Bradbury reflected on a mid-week practice where Cook was firing up the troops as they ran through screen passes.
“We had finished and were huddling up for the next one, and Dalvin goes to all five linemen, ‘You guys just get your guys down. I’ll do the rest. That’s it.’ He just had this confidence about him, and we did too, that as long as the ball is in his hands, he’s going to make something happen.”
Cook carried that attitude from practice into the game, scoring on a 50-yard screen play to break the game open Sunday, getting fantastic blocks along the way from Ezra Cleveland, Brian O’Neill and Bradbury — one of the few passes Kirk Cousins had to throw on the day.
Garrett Bradbury and Ezra Cleveland with two ridiculously good blocks on this catch and run. https://t.co/pFAriv6HiA
— Sam Ekstrom (@SamEkstrom) November 1, 2020
The Vikings’ run-pass ratio in their embarrassing Week 6 loss to Atlanta was 13 to 36. They flipped those numbers around against the Packers with 34 runs and 14 passes, which appeared to bolster the confidence of the offensive line, a unit constructed specifically for games like that.
The rookie Cleveland, in his second career game, looked like a different player than he did against the Falcons. He was the second-highest graded Vikings player, per Pro Football Focus, and it’s suddenly hard to imagine Pat Elflein or Dru Samia seeing the field at right guard as long as Cleveland plays that well.
“Ezra did great,” said Bradbury. “I mean it’s not going to come to you that first drive or your first game, but he’s a great player. He’s willing to learn, so he’s got a bright future ahead of him, and it was awesome playing next to him. Obviously winning is a lot of fun. That’s what we keep trying to tell him in the locker room, ‘This is how it’s supposed to feel,’ because obviously his first start we didn’t win the game.”
Maybe the Packers front isn’t as intimidating when the quarterback isn’t dropping back 35 times a game. That’s how many pass attempts Cousins averaged in his last five meetings with the Packers with only one win to his name. Sunday he didn’t throw the ball more than 10 yards downfield.
Thanks to Cousins’ short drops and minimal dropbacks, the offensive line posted a clean sheet: Zero pressures allowed. (Pro Football Focus didn’t charge anybody with the sack where Dean Lowry cheated on play-action.) Conversely, the defensive line recorded 15 pressures on Rodgers, who was 5-of-9 when pressured and 2-of-8 when blitzed.
“Basically, we play for each other,” said D.J. Wonnum, who recorded the game-winning strip sack. “If one guy does his job, it may present an opportunity for somebody else to make a play. That last play, you saw Jay Holmes and Ifeadi, they flushed the quarterback to my side so I was able to make that play. I feel like, the more and more reps we get, we’re going to continue playing together and having a feel for each other and continuing to get after the quarterback.”
Despite their youth and inexperience on both sides of the ball, the Vikings won the battle in trenches Sunday and pulled away from the Packers. That’s a formula that can win them ballgames even with performance issues and a lack of depth at other positions.
