NFC North Round-Up: Week 18 Includes Some Spoiled Cheese
Josh Frey
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The 2022 NFL regular season has officially come to an end, and it concluded with a matchup between two NFC North rivals, the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers. While the Lions turned the Packers into spoiled cheese, earlier in the day, the Minnesota Vikings faced off with the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field. Here’s how all the action went down in the final week of the regular season.
Vikings Get Their 13th Win; Bears Get No. 1 Pick
The Minnesota Vikings had an outside chance at snatching the No. 2 seed in the playoffs this weekend, so because of that, they ran their starters out for the first half of their game against the Chicago Bears. After jumping out to a 16-6 lead at halftime, Minnesota swapped in many of their backups for the remainder of the game, but they ended up winning 29-13.
Ultimately, the Vikings didn’t get the No. 2 seed because the 49ers stomped the Cardinals by a score of 38-13 later on in the afternoon. Even still, Minnesota got their 13th win of the regular season for just the third time in the history of their franchise (1998, 2017).
The loss for Chicago isn’t all bad, though. Because the Texans beat the Indianapolis Colts (and inexplicably fired their head coach, Lovie Smith, just a couple hours later), the Bears moved into the top spot in the 2023 NFL Draft.
This pick is huge for the Bears particularly because they do not need to take a quarterback. Because of this, they could likely very easily trade this pick to another QB-needy team and get a haul of draft picks in return. Teams like the Indianapolis Colts or Las Vegas Raiders come to mind.
Lions Play Spoiler on Sunday Night
The Detroit Lions were eliminated from playoff contention when the Seattle Seahawks snuck by the Los Angeles Rams with an overtime victory on Sunday afternoon, but the Lions still were in no mood to see their division rivals get in the tournament.
The Lions went into Green Bay, and on national TV finally ended the monster that was the resurging Green Bay Packers. Jared Goff made a few mistakes throughout the evening, but when it mattered most, he made multiple plays that helped lead the Lions to victory.
Aaron Rodgers made a few nice throws as well, but the mistakes outshined the positives from this game. When Rodgers threw the interception to Kerby Joseph at the end of the game, that was the final dagger in what had been a difficult night for the Green Bay quarterback.
With Detroit’s victory, neither of the Lions or Packers make the playoffs, and instead, that honor goes to the Seattle Seahawks. Seattle, the No. 7 seed in the NFC, heads to San Francisco next weekend to take on the No. 2 seed 49ers in the Wild Card round.
Josh Frey is a Class of 2020 graduate of The College of Idaho with a bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing. He also earned minors in History, Human Biology, and Journalism. When he’s not writing about the NFL, Josh enjoys marathon training, playing video games, or rooting for the Milwaukee Brewers and Bucks. For more of his opinions, check out his Twitter account: @Freyed_Chicken.