The Minnesota Vikings picked up a victory on Sunday, but it wasn’t pretty. The 64,000 people walking out of U.S. Bank Stadium probably needed a shower after the 28-24 win over the Detroit Lions. Despite the W, there were a lot of things to complain about.
But, in the end, the Vikings got the victory in more ways than one. That’s because Kevin O’Connell won the kind of game that Mike Zimmer didn’t last year.
It starts with everything that went wrong for the Vikings on Sunday. O’Connell was touted as an offensive genius, yet Minnesota ranks 16th in the league in points scored. For the third-straight week, they couldn’t break the 30-point barrier.
Kirk Cousins was at the center of the struggle. His fans will point to the game-winning touchdown pass to K.J. Osborn, but he looked shaky before that. Cousins overthrew Osborn on a wide-open touchdown in the second quarter and seemed like he needed an extra second to run through his progressions. As his accuracy waxed and waned, he appeared bound for another “Bad Kirk” game.
It didn’t help that Cousins didn’t have the option of going to Justin Jefferson. After being matchup-proof throughout his career, Jefferson was shut down for the second consecutive week, this time by Jeff Okudah. With three catches for 14 yards, Cousins had to look elsewhere for most of his production.
The Vikings fell behind by 14 points, and boos started to rain down. The same negativity that had plagued them over the past two seasons was making its way through the open doors of U.S. Bank Stadium after Greg Joseph missed a pair of field goals.
This type of start would have driven Zimmer crazy, but the Vikings bounced back. Cousins started using his secondary options and found Adam Thielen for a wide-open touchdown. Minnesota went on another drive led by Dalvin Cook, who sprinted into the end zone to tie the game at 14.
Minnesota suddenly had new life — but it was about to turn back the other way. The Vikings couldn’t stop the run and coughed up four yards per carry to Jamaal Williams. Even though Williams went full Hingle McCringleberry after his touchdown put Detroit up 21-14, a successful day for the Lions was about to get better.
On a handoff in the third quarter, Cook ran into the back of Ezra Cleveland and immediately fell to the ground. The ball went on the turf, and Cook grabbed his shoulder. The injury ended his afternoon, and the Vikings found themselves down by 10 after another field goal.
Things were looking bleak in the early stages of the fourth quarter until Cousins showed signs of life. A couple of holding penalties by Amani Oruwariye put the Vikings into prime field position, and an Alexander Mattison touchdown cut it to 24-21.
The Vikings picked up a stop and gave the ball back to their offense, which faced a fourth-and-8. This would have been a dilemma under Zimmer. With over two minutes to play, Zimmer would have punted the ball and relied on his defense to make the stop. With the way Detroit was moving on offense, they probably could have picked up a first down and run the clock out.
Instead, O’Connell went for it. They didn’t get it, but it put just enough temptation into Dan Campbell‘s mind. The Vikings’ defense stopped the Lions on three-straight plays. They already picked up four fourth-down conversions on the day. Although Campbell admitted after the game that he should have gone for it, he wanted to put points on the scoreboard and brought out Austin Seibert, who missed a 54-yard field goal attempt.
That put the ball back into the hands of the Vikings’ offense. Under Zimmer, this could have been a delicate dance to kill the clock and hope for a chance to kick a game-tying field goal. Under O’Connell, the objective was to score by any means necessary.
The drive — and the game — concluded with a Cousins touchdown pass to Osborn with 45 seconds left and a calculated risk to bring the defense back onto the field. Although Detroit drove to midfield, Jared Goff heaved up a desperate pass that Josh Metellus intercepted.
All sorts of things went wrong during this game, but the Vikings left the field 2-1. When Minnesota won a game in a similar fashion in Chicago last year, it brought a stern lecture from Zimmer. But O’Connell delivered his message differently.
“I saw the look in your eye all week long that no matter what the f— happened out there today, we were going to come in here for the second time with this feeling right here,” O’Connell said in a video from Vikings.com. “There are all kinds of things we can do better across the board, but what I love the most as adversity hit, we could have f—ing checked out. We looked across and said, ‘We’re doing our thing today, but they aren’t doing theirs. Not one f—ing time.'”
O’Connell’s words resonated. Under Zimmer, the bad things that happened on the football field were enough to fill an entire PowerPoint presentation. Under O’Connell, the Vikings were focused on doing anything they could to come away with the win.
That’s what caused the end of the Zimmer era. Instead of focusing on their own process, Zimmer often worried about what was happening around him. It wound up costing the Vikings enough games to keep them out of the playoffs — and Zimmer his job.
Sunday’s game was a big victory for the Vikings, both because of what they did do and what they didn’t.
