This Team

There’s rarely been a dull moment with the 2022 Minnesota Vikings. At 11-3, there’s been a lot of great moments. The wins have been thrilling, too thrilling. 10 of the wins have been by one score. The 11th win? That was the first one against the Green Bay Packers. No matter the margin, a win against the Packers is always thrilling. It’s been 14 weeks since the Vikings have won a game by more than a single score. A long time. Seven times this season, Kirk Cousins has guided the Vikings offense to a game-winning score in the fourth quarter. None was more thrilling than Saturday’s wild comeback win over the Indianapolis Colts. 

Down 33-0 at the half. Impossible. 

Since 1930, teams were 1,548-1-1 when leading by 30 or more points. 

Since Saturday, teams are 0-1 when leading by 30 or more points.

This Vikings team is different. 

It’d just be nice to see more of the second half against the Colts and less of the first half. In the first half of this crazy game, the Vikings were in the Christmas spirit. They were very giving. 

The Vikings gave the Colts:

-a blocked punt touchdown

-two failed fourth down attempts from about their own 30-yard line

-a pick-6

The Vikings giving ways gave the Colts a breezy 20 points. Of the 36 points that the Colts scored in the game, only seven were scored by their offense. 

The Vikings just had to get out of their own way. In the second half, they did. They scored 14 points in the third quarter, 22 points in the fourth quarter, three points in overtime. The Vikings offense scored 39 points after halftime. The defense gave up three points. 

This team. 

More often than not, the 2022 Minnesota Vikings does what it has to do to win games. Is that a problem? It is for my health but winning games is all that matters. The Vikings are winning games. 

Perhaps the best thing that this Vikings team is doing is that they aren’t letting bad things derail them. I started thinking about this during the game against the Washington Commanders. It was after the play in which a rogue official took out Camryn Bynum while he was trying to defend a deep pass. An NFL official tackled a player. I’d never seen anything like it. The official kept Bynum from a sure interception and allowed a Commanders touchdown. The Vikings responded by this strange play by not letting it bother them. They went and won the game. Against the Colts, nothing went the Vikings way in the first half. A few things didn’t go their way in the second half. The officiating was horrible. Two defensive touchdowns (one in each half) were taken from them. A big Jalen Reagor punt return was wiped away by a phantom facemask penalty. A lot of things have to go right to successfully come back from a 33-point deficit. Not everything went right for the Vikings. There was the horrible officiating. There was their own mistakes. They went three-and-out on their first possession of the second half. Cousins threw an interception. They turned the ball over on downs. They didn’t even take advantage of their lone takeaway.  The Vikings needed five touchdowns in the second half. Somehow, they did it despite having four empty possessions. The Vikings did not let their mistakes or the ridiculous officiating stop them from erasing a 33-point deficit. Incredible. If nothing else, this Vikings team is resilient. Very resilient. 

The Minnesota Vikings are NFC North Champions. If they are to do anything in the playoffs, they must do what they have not done in any of their 11 wins. They must get out of their own way. They’ve yet to play a complete game. It’s ok to be saying that during the first month of the season. It’s December. They better have found those complete games in January. And February. 

This team.