AVERTING DISASTER

VIKINGS 27

JETS 22

Oh the Vikings tricked us on Sunday. With less than a minute to go in the first half, the Vikings held a 20-3 lead. They had played arguably their best half of football all season, and with a 3 score lead over a good, but offensively challenged team, it looked like this was finally that day the 2022 Vikings would cruise to an easy win. 

But there we were, in the waning seconds, watching Mike White throw a 4th down pass towards the endzone that could have won the game for the Jets and completed their comeback.

I was hoping this would be not just a victorious Sunday but a division clinching Sunday. We needed a win and a Lions loss to clinch the north.

We got off to a good start, with Harrison Smith picking off a tipped ball on the Jets opening drive. We went 3 and out, but were already in field.goal range. And hey, Greg Joseph actually made the 50+ yarder!

The Jets answered with a field goal too. Our offense was very slow to start. Kirk started 0-5. He was genuinely misfiring. The Jets secondary was mugging our guys, which contributed.

What finally sparked us was going for it on 4th and 2 near midfield. A risk for sure in a game that was looking defensive. But Kirk made a clutch completion to Osborn and we were off and running. That drive ended with a.Cook TD run. 

The next drive was even better. Kirk had a terrific scramble for a first down, then hit Jalen Reagor on a deep shot. Mattison darted in for the TD and we were up 17-3. 

And our defense was showing up, facing the media's new obsession Mike White. We had that opening pick, and should have had another but Evans and Bynum knocked into each other and prevented the pick. We weren't doing anything spectacular on defense, just making basic coverage plays. It's amazing what just trying can do. By late in the half they had only crossed the 50 once. We even stopped them on their own risky 4th down try late in the half. 

We scored again after that stop. Just a field goal, but it pushed the lead to 17.

Unfortunately we let the Jets take advantage of their scant remaining time and get in field goal range. Of course, with most teams a 60 yard field goal is a Longshot, but not against us. And Greg Zuerlein of course drilled the kick, the 3rd 60+ yarder on us this season. 

It zapped the momentum a little, but we still had a 14 point lead and were getting the ball to start the 3rd quarter. 

But oh that 3rd quarter. We have stunk in that frame all year, and boy did we again. That offense that had put up 3 straight scores on one of the league's best defenses went away. 

We had a 3 and out. Then the next drive Kirk overthrew Hockenson deep and JJ flat out dropped a potential big gainer, leading to another punt after Kirk for sacked. The following drive ended in another sack. 

As this was going on, our defense also reverted to their too often poor form. The Jets scored on their first 4 second half drives. They got a field goal. Then another. Then another. They just kept chipping away. And we let them, giving up so many of those easy pitch and catches.

We took the concept of "bend but don't break" to an extreme. The.low.point was when White hit Garrett Wilson on an absurd 60 yard YAC where we had 2 defenders just crash into each other and let Wilson loose. Had he not just barely stepped out of bounds at the 11 that would have been a TD and maybe a different result. But again here we held them to 3, cutting the lead to 20-15 early in the 4th. 

Ah, the 4th quarter. All throughout that dismal 3rd I'm just hoping we can hurry up and get to the 4th quarter, where the 2022 Vikings are just always getting it done. 

And a big part of that has been the offense always being able to get that one drive they desperately need. 

Well with our lead down to 5 we needed it. And our catatonic second half offense snapped to life. Kirk hit Mundt for 12, then Hockenson for 13. Cook ran for 11. Then Thielen got his 1 big catch of the day, gaining 25 (although he inexplicably ran backwards after the catch). A few plays later Kirk hit JJ for the TD and some welcome breathing room. 

But our defense hates breathing. We immediately gave up a 48 yard run by Zonovan Knight. Then a DPI put the ball at the 3. We stopped them the next 3 plays, and on 4th and goal at the 1 a Mike White sneak at first appeared short. 4th quarter magic again!

Well, no. Replay showed White broke the plane and the lead was back to 5. Our offense quickly went 3 and out and punted, and here came the Jets again. 

White just missed a deep shot, but then hit a 23 yarder. We got the Jets into a 4th and 10 near midfield, but then allowed a ridiculous 28 yard completion...which got the Jets into that redzone yet again. And again they got to the 1, but a pair of White throws were incomplete and we turned them over. 

But the game wasn't over. We are pinned at the 1. They have 3 timeouts. It's a tough spot but I hated that we just conceded a 3 and out here. Yeah we burned off the timeouts, but with where we would be punting they were going to get great field position, great enough that a limited amount of time was unlikely to really matter. 

So we punt, and the Jets had just 43 yards to cover with over a minute to do it. It took just 2 throws to get the Jets back in, you guessed it, the redzone. Fortunately we made a couple tackles inbounds to burn the clock. Still, the Jets had a shot. Harrison Smith looked to have a game sealing pick but dropped it. Was the magic finally spent? 

Not yet. On 4th down and 10 at the 19, White fired a pass to the endzone, but Cam Bynum got in front and made the pick that ended the game and secured win #10. 

9th 1 score win of the year. This one wasn't a rousing victory like most of the others. This was pure survival. Coming that close to blowing a 17 point lead, and losing a game you had no business losing would have been a massive letdown.

It didn't need to come to this. You would swear the Vikings do this on purpose just to fuck with us. 

It's certainly a good win though. The Jets are a good team. They will be a tough out for anybody they face in the playoffs for sure. And even with the offense's vanishing act they put up 27 on a defense that hadn't given up that many since September.

The Vikings just finished a 5 game stretch against teams that are all either in playoff spots or were when we played them. All very good defenses. And we went 4-1. No sane fan would turn that down. 

We didn't get any outside help in anything. Detroit won, so we couldn't clinch the north, but we play them next week. The Eagles won so the #1 seed remains a longshot. And the 49ers won again to stay 2 back of us, although they lost Jimmy Garappolo for the season. We did eliminate the Packers from the division race, so that's nice.

And now we are through the tough stretch of the schedule. We have only 1 playoff contender left in our last 5 (Giants here on Christmas Eve). We may even be able to win a couple games comforta.....no no, not falling for that again.