We Still Don’t Know How Close the Vikings Are To Contending
The Minnesota Vikings’ 2022 season ended with Kirk Cousins’ infamous fourth-and-eight checkdown to T.J. Hockenson. Afterward, Kevin O’Connell commented on how hard it was to experience a 13-win season end so abruptly.
“Tough to come in and talk to your team when we didn’t get it done tonight,” O’Connell rued. “It’s one of the closest connected groups in the entire NFL. There’s some real tears in [the locker room]. There’s real guys that expected to have a chance to win a world championship.”
He said something similar after the Los Angeles Rams eliminated them on Monday night.
“Very tough feeling in that locker room right now,” he said after losing 27-9 in Glendale, Ariz. “This team was really one-of-one in my mind as far as the feeling that’s in there right now, the brotherhood. This team truly did a lot of special things this year, but we just didn’t play well enough to win a football game.”
Two years ago, Vegas favored the Vikings by 2.5 points over the New York Giants; the oddsmakers favored Minnesota by 2.5 over the Rams on Monday. Players were emotional after losing to the Giants in 2022; they had tears in their eyes in Glendale. The Vikings won 13 games two years ago and 14 this season.
However, the most important parallel is that, because they lost in the first round, we don’t know how the Vikings would have fared in their next matchup.
In 2022, they would have faced the 13-4 San Francisco 49ers in the Divisional round. The 49ers were coming off an NFC Championship run and reached the Super Bowl in 2023. Kyle Shanahan and Co. also beat Mike Zimmer’s Vikings 27-10 in 2019, the last time Minnesota advanced past the first round.
The 49ers would have probably beaten Minnesota again in 2022. San Franciso beat the Seattle Seahawks 41-23 in the Wild Card round and the Dallas Cowboys 19-12 in the Divisional round before losing 31-7 to the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship.
In Minnesota’s 2022 Wild Card game against the Giants, Daniel Jones had 301 yards passing and 78 rushing against Ed Donatell’s defense. Brock Purdy and his arsenal of weapons likely would have produced a similar result in Santa Clara, Calif. Still, we’ll never know because the Vikings didn’t get that far.
Similarly, we don’t know how the Vikings would have fared in Philadelphia this year because they lost a pseudo-home game to the Rams. It would have been an intriguing matchup between Minnesota, with its unique team chemistry, and the Eagles, who don’t appear to be getting along.
Still, the Vikings have lost in their last two trips to Philadelphia. They have only won there once, in 2018, when the Eagles beat them 38-7 in the NFC Championship game. Vegas likely would have favored Philadelphia, which also won 14 games and beat the Green Bay Packers 22-10 in the Wild Card round.
After taking over from Zimmer, O’Connell has changed Minnesota’s culture and created a winning standard. However, the Vikings are building a reputation as a team that can win in the regular season but loses in the playoffs.
However, this year’s team was better than it was in 2022. Flores’ defense was one of the best in the league, and Dontell’s was one of the worst. Still, they must find the disconnect between winning in the regular season and losing in the first round of the playoffs.
“These are one-game eliminations, and if you don’t find a way to play well in those 60 minutes against the types of teams we’re gonna play in January, then you’re gonna lose,” O’Connell said, searching for answers after the Rams eliminated Minnesota on Monday. “What I’ve gotta do is continue to make sure that I continue to reinforce the process we’ve had here.”
Since arriving in Minnesota, O’Connell has talked about establishing a championship standard. However, we don’t know how close the Vikings are to contending because they’ve exited stage left before they’ve played the NFL’s best teams under the brightest lights.
