Minnesota Vikings Outlast Arizona Cardinals, Continue NFC Playoff Push

The Vikings are in a contentious battle for the top of the NFC North and the NFC. An uninspiring but by no means dispiriting win against the Cardinals continues their march to the postseason.

Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images

Managing a come-from-behind win in stark contrast to how they produced wins at the beginning of the season, the Minnesota Vikings secured a 23-22 win over the Arizona Cardinals in a tense affair that really only ramped up as the game was winding down.

The Vikings defense played with fire throughout the game, and in particular had difficulty closing down after making positive plays. They made some changes in their approach and though it puts some more variety on film, it might be something they’d keep on the back-burner as they approach the final stretch of the season.

The offense has their own questions to answer, but it’s nice to have to look in the mirror after a win rather than a loss.

With an airtight race in the NFC North — they’re behind the Detroit Lions by one game and ahead of the Green Bay Packers by just as much, with both left on the schedule — the Vikings cannot afford to drop a game if they really want a shot at the top seed.

Those three teams have combined for 20 wins and six losses, or a .769 record. There is no other combination of teams in any other division or conference that can exceed that without including the Lions or Vikings.

The Bills might allow the AFC to tie that if they win against the San Francisco 49ers in a group that conjoins the Kansas City Chiefs and Pittsburgh Steelers, all leading their own divisions.

It is a ferociously difficult division and the Vikings are keeping pace.

Offensive Struggles, Successes

Run Woes?

The Vikings will have to figure out how persistent Aaron Jones’ fumbling problem is. That was, by no means, the biggest problem the Vikings had this week but it might be the biggest issue worth addressing as they proceed with their push to the playoffs.

Right now, not counting the fumbles on handoffs that are charged to the quarterback, Jones’ fumble rate is twice that of an average NFL running back and more than twice his pre-Vikings fumble rate. Jones, of course, made up for his fumbles in this game with the game-sealing score, but it was almost a hollow redemption.

Aside from the fact that his errors impacted the game by multiple scores – a drop in the end zone turned into a field goal and a fumble in Viking territory turned into a Cardinals three-point drive – Jones’ score was necessary but almost too early.

A defense that was consistently allowing the offense into the red zone and field goal scoring range would now have to defend a go-ahead drive up one point with 1:13 left and three timeouts remaining for the offense.

While Jones isn’t entirely in control of this – his job is to get open and he did just that – it may have been smarter to try and down it after getting the first by walking out of bounds into the end zone.

This might not be supported by the evidence – is it better to take the sure touchdown or go out of bounds at the one-yard line with four attempts to gain one yard?

Win probability metrics agnostic to Minnesota’s overall defensive performance in that game suggested that the Vikings had an only 55 percent chance of winning after they kicked the game-winning extra point.

It is better to have scored the touchdown than not, naturally – the Vikings’ win probability before that score was just 45 percent. But when your choice is to run out of bounds or score, things change. But first-and-goal from the one-yard line with 1:13 remaining would have given the Vikings a win probability of just 50 percent.

Only unique factors – like the Vikings’ defensive performance throughout the game – would change that equation. On the other hand, the Vikings didn’t feel comfortable running the ball all that often. They called 11 designed runs and though the end-of-game numbers looked fine, the overall feeling was that the running game was struggling.