Lions Come Back From 20-Point Deficit To Down Vikings In Overtime, 26-23

I was wrong about Hanson. Glad we kept him.
Calvin. Wow. Just wow. 6 TDs in 3 games.
Backus. Never been a fan. Always thought he was average at best. Today was just ugly for him. Bad game. As much as I don’t like him, he’s better than he performed today.
Titus might just end up being special. He’s been looking great.

When we get Fairley back, it’s going to be even better once he gets his groove.

And Mikel Leshoure is going to be special once he’s healthy next year. He’s traveling with the team, yeah?

I’d love to see Kitna take some snaps. Anyone know if the game will be nationally televised?

Perfect way to end that streak

I was thinking, oh no, not again. Please be real this time Lions, don’t break my heart again. Admittedly those thoughts were fleeting, but I did get the proverbial abused fan flinch there a couple of times.

I never game up hope though, I never turned the TV off, I just found ways to believe. Saying, well if we can score two TD’s more than them in the third quarter then we got a real shot here. I knew it would be on the defense and offense both, to play an almost perfect half. We pulled it out!

I only found myself wishing that Jason Fox was healthy so that we could bench Backus next game, to send a message about taking two stupid penalties to almost cost us a win.

I didn’t think ‘Same ol’ Lions’, but I DID think it was just not the Lions’s day when it went from being 13-0 with us threatening to make it 13-7 or 13-3 to 20-0 on a broken play in under a minute. At that point, I figured the football gods were screwing with us today, went and played Modern Warfare for a bit. Came back in time to see Hanson’s first FG, and felt better.

 - This is my mind was nearly Stafford’s best game in a Lions uniform. Sure, it wasn’t perfect and there was miscues, but importantly he played like a clutch QB when we needed him, helping to lead us back from a massive hole. Not only that, he did this while under pressure from the Vikes defence. Terrific performance in which I can now truly and utterly proclaim that Stafford will be a elite QB.

 - The offensive line was very disappointing. Backus really struggled against Allen. Possibly he just had an off game, or possibly his time is coming up, but his performance needs to be rectified. Run blocking was very poor also.

 - Running game was poor, as I said. Best didn’t seem to have much explosion or ability to break any tackles. Maybe he was injured, but it was a very lackluster performance…

 - But in a massive plus, the receivers were brilliant. What can you say about CJ? He’s clutch and a freak, and I can’t believe the Vikes left him in single coverage as much as they did. Titus was hugely impressive, he’s got vice grips for hands apparantly and looks to me to be a great #2 of the future. And happily, my man Grew showed up big today, he was everywhere and looked physical.

 - I was mostly happy with the defensive line. Apart from some big runs early on, they kept AP fairly limited and it seemed as though Suh and co. could get penetration fairly easily. 4 sacks is also nice, McNabb definitely didn’t feel comfortable.

 - The Linebackers had a mostly strong game. Tully and JD played very well, even Levy showed some good play.

 - The secondary is much the same story, no massive problems or concerns, they did there job for the most part and that’s what you want.

 - I’d be remiss not to mention Hanson, who booted 4 FG’s plus the winner. He really deserves to be the one to kill that streak.

It’s upsetting that I missed the second half live, but you can’t help but feel like this win showed that we have the grit, talent and confidence to win games in all sorts of situations. This is clearly the best Lions team I’ve seen, and the talent on both sides of the ball is something I’m definitely not used to. 3-0! Bring on Dallas!

I’m sure NBC can’t wait to be able to flex Indy out of these Sunday Night games.

It wasn’t working and it seemed he was always going to the same draw play. At some point, I wish he had converted the run/pass game into the screen/pass game. It would have taken some of the heat off of Stafford as far as number/strength of blitzes.

It just felt like one of those games where the Vikings showed from the get go that this game was their season on the line and the Lions just could not match their intensity, especially with our offensive unit and special teams. The defence looked like they were hanging in there.

Then Stafford showed what a high quality [I won’t call him elite yet] NFL starter can do and the defence stepped it up. And our receivers showed what they can do.

One factor that everyone seems to be overlooking is that in spite of the pressure, the Lions did not turn the ball over at all. That would have been the death knell for the game.

Hats off to the leaders [particularly KVB and Stafford] and coaches of this team.

I will stick with my 12 and 4 prediction.

he was huge on both touchdown drives. T Young is showing what a great pick that was also. I am blown away by how good our receiving core is compared to last year. I know Stafford has a great deal to do with that, but most of the catches made today were not easy ones. Obviously CJ was awesome but we already knew that.

Today’s game will turn some non-believers for sure! This team is coming together in a big way…I am loving it!!

The Lions now have the longest current regular season winning streak at 7. The Redskins lost their last game last year as did the Bills. The Packers only won their last 2 for a current streak of 5.

This is defiantly an odd feeling.

After seeing how the Queens fell apart against Tampa last week I knew the game was going to be made after the 1st half.

We needed to come out strong in the 2nd half and we did. About 3 1/2 minutes and nearly as many yards as we totaled in the first half we got a TD. We made adjustments and got our offense on a roll. AP was a big problem but luckily it appears that McNabb is not an elite QB.

What can I say, we had no run game and Stafford took some big hits but we came back in the 2nd half on the road in a place where we haven’t won for 13 years!

This tough grind out win, in spite of all our problems, just proves the resolve of this team.

Vikings fans seem to think one of the reasons they lost was because the ball was not given to AP in the second half.

So did Detroit shut down AP and that is why he do not get the ball in the second half or did Minnesota coaching staff blow it?

Congratulations!!!!!!!!! Detroit motor city kicking ass and taking names!!!!

Hat Tip to the players, coaching staff, and front office. Hard work pays off in the end.

Somebody pinch me. Go Lions

and do Jared Allen’s stupid wind-up explosion celebration (that’s supose to be a penalty for going to the ground and celebrating). But, again Hanson is just way too classy.

and Staff gets interviewed on the field, then Suh gets interviewed in the loverroom

Personally wish ya’d lost but good job

as for the people who said this would be a blow out… Well at least you won.

hope you have a great season.

Says " what happened to your team?" I said 4 Quaters – 60 minutes in a Game, it`s Minny, just watch. I quess i should have said 62 minutes.

right now, it seems that the Vikings can play with teams, but they can’t win. I wouldn’t look too much into this game and say that the Lions are not as good as we thought they were.

The run defense/pass defense did what it needed to, to win, especially down the stretch.

Football games are marathons, not sprints. I’m not sure why we keep saying “we need to start faster,” your start doesn’t win football games. Over the years, how many leads have we blown? Today this team showed us it can dig deep. Good win.

I still don’t like the OT rules.

6 of the top 10 lost with PIT tied late, but driving.

but coolstandings has our playoff odds at 85.6% with a 39.1% chance of winning the division and a 46.5% of winning the wild card. They’ve got our expected record at 11-5. They simulate the season through their computer like 10,000 times or something, so in 85% of their simulations, we’re making the playoffs. Kinda cool, if, again, hardly a guarantee.

Titus young was amazing. He made some big-time catches to keep drives going. I hope people will stop criticizing Grew now…BTW, he blocks too!

Hey boys over the past several years, I have been reading other forums and such. Just before the draft i found pod. Let me say Sean you do great work up to date info along with tons of accurate info. lastly i think its talif who does the stats great work dude love the break downs. This site is unlike the others which is full of bs and kool aid drinkers. I visit this site 5 or more times a day since I’ve found it back in april , so i guess i was lazy to make an account lol. About the game from my perspective as i saw it. I loved how we used pettigrew,and titus young. I was yelling in front of my girl saying utilize best as a wide out when he had that one decent catch that turned into a big play. lastly bacus wow dude really twice twice twice, glad that its your last year in the nfl. If i got scared like you did i wouldn’t play college rugby lol. Going into next week on the road with Dallas. romo prolly will die from suh or avril killing him. I think its going to be a great match up depending on how long romo stays in the game. From what i saw today Detroit has tons of work todo before sunday. This game today was to close for my comfort. I cant choose who will win next week i want the lions to of course but they got some work todo. PS been a Detroit fan since 88 and for all you wanna be bandwagon fans do me a favor and hold your breath for at least 10 min. cuz if you wasnt a fan durring millen era then you shouldnt be one now.

Hilliard was pretty OK for a backup IMO. He was beat a couple times but Minnesota’s DL was playing like animals backed into an 0-3 corner. Not sure whether or not we can lean on him as a starter though. I’d like to see him after a full week of practice with the 1’s.

I was extremely wrong about Gosder. I thought he’d have a good game but he pretty much shit the bed. It’s unfortunate because he has so much potential. He’s dug himself into a hole with the coaches and I doubt he’ll be here next season. He might even be traded before the deadline in week 6.

Backus pissed his pants on TV. In front of everybody. I think he cried a little bit too. I haven’t seen his brain take a shit like that in a long time. Will Jim Schwartz end his consecutive games started streak? It would be unfair to Gosder if Backus were to go unpunished, but who would even fill in at LT? It would be so strange seeing Fox there (If he’s even able to play considering he was in a walking boot not long ago), or anyone aside from Backus really.

Sims, Raiola, and Peterman have been pretty damn good this season. I think Linehan sees this too and is trying to take advantage of it with his play calling. Unfortunately we were playing from behind yesterday and he was mainly only running to keep the D honest. I’d expect him to make more creative play calls in the future when we aren’t down 20 points.

I’ve noticed these last few weeks that Rob Sims is extremely athletic. You see him making blocks down field on long plays all the time. He’s our best pulling guard by far and we have seen a lot of runs to the right side because of that. Peterman’s surprisingly quick as well.

Raiola has been a boss so far. He’s even been pushing guys around a little in the run game. His strongest asset has always been his mental game and that showed this week. The penalty he drew from Min was bad ass. He almost did it again later in the game but Backus false started.

i thought it was over when they went up 20 to non but they battled back in the second half and this was probely the best game ive ever seen from lions since i never really saw barry play but like i said a few days ago the oline needs to be address not only the sacks but the mental mistakes from both our LT and RT hopefully this doesnt become a theme from backus since he is better than that step up

I was helping a bud w/his boat Sun. and was mad when we didn’t get to a tv just in time for me to see 9:42 into the 3rd quarter.Was disappointed we didn’t have any points but not down on the team as it was 20 down.My friend said I willed them back to win and said I was hardly saying anything just looked like I was concentrating hard.Funny because in 2009 everytime I watched a game they lost qn won when I didn’t but this yr. I think I’m the good luck for the team!
Seriously I give the game ball to the D for keeping us in it and keeping them to 3 points in the 2nd half.
And CJ I love you man!
no homo