The Ghost of Vikings Halloweens Past
Tom Woldum
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With the Minnesota Vikings taking center stage in a Sunday Night showdown this evening against the Dallas Cowboys, it got me thinking about Halloween Nights Past. The Vikes, as it turns out, carry an overall 3-5 record in games played on October 31 over their 60+ year history. All three of those victories occurred back in the twentieth century, but they are 0-3 in the current one–having lost to the Giants (2004), Patriots (2010) and Bears (2016) in their most recent Halloween contests. The 2016 contest was their only Monday Night appearance that coincided with Halloween, and it was indeed a scary 20-10 loss at the hands of the reborn Monsters of the Midway, who dominated.
Before tonight’s set, the Vikings have only once before made an appearance on a Halloween Edition of Sunday Night Football, and that happened 28 years ago, in 1993. As it happened, that game was eerily familiar to what we saw in the weeks immediately before the bye here in Viking Land. But it’s Halloween, and who doesn’t like a good ghost story?
Playing in the Metrodome before a crowd of 53,739, the 4-3 Vikings were hosting the Detroit Lions on that night, which was no doubt breezy, partly cloudy, with a full moon and periodic howls emanating from far away. At the time, the Lions were 6-2 and perched in first place in the NFC Central Division. Yes, you read that right—this edition of the Barry Sanders-led Lions would indeed go on to win their second division title in three years, a period of legitimacy that has not been seen in Detroit in even a single season since. So this was a key game, situated near both team’s halfway marks, and the winner would be sitting atop the Central.
The fans were treated to three extremely sharp quarters of Viking football, with a few exceptions briefly interrupting the Halloween fun: starting Quarterback Jim McMahon left the game early with a dislocated shoulder, and Barry Word (clearly the second-most effective running back named “Barry” on the field that night) fumbled following a pass reception, allowing Willie Clay to scoop up the loose ball and romp 39 yards for a Lions touchdown.
Other than that, it was one big Halloween Party for the host Vikings, as the defense swarmed Sanders, allowing the future Hall of Famer only 64 rushing yards, and Detroit managed only two field goals in the game’s first 45 minutes. Meanwhile backup QB Sean Salisbury, as Dan Barreiro would note in the following morning’s edition of the Star Tribune, “masqueraded beautifully as an NFL quarterback”, throwing touchdown passes to both Anthony Carter and Cris Carter. Rookie Robert Smith rushed for the bulk of his 115 yards through an overmatched Detroit defense. After three quarters, the Vikings had 23 first downs against 5 for the Lions, and the score stood, quite comfortably, at Minnesota 27, Detroit 13.
And then, in the fourth quarter—see if this seems at all familiar, folks—everything changed. Like Jeckyll and Hyde. Like a vampire after dark. Like a werewolf beneath the aforementioned full moon. It was, may I remind you,Halloween.
As the quarter opened, the Lions faced second and 15 at their own 7 yard line. Rodney Peete stepped back to pass and was shocked to find his flanker, Herman Moore, completely uncovered at the Lion 45, a beneficiary of blown coverage by the Minnesota secondary. “All I wanted to do was catch it,” Moore would explain after the game, and catch it he did. “I wasn’t going to worry about running until it was in my arms”. With no defenders remotely close to him, he could afford to cradle the toss and still have plenty of time to turn and take a leisurely jog down the field, completing a 93 yard reception.
The Lions had found their inspiration, while head coach Denny Green chose the time-honored approach favored by many Vikings leaders before and since of playing conservative, in hopes of preserving their 7-point lead over the next 14-plus minutes. He was going to turn the game over to his trusted defense, and his faith in John Randle and company was well-founded—they were ranked #1 in the league in defense at the time, and were only the one botched pass-play short of having kept Detroit out of the end zone for the entire evening. The Lions responded by bottling up Smith on the inside, and effectively stopping the predictable third-and-long pass plays that came their way. In the final quarter, the Lions would pile up 8 first downs against the Vikings’ 2.
Still, the final quarter progressed as Green had hoped, with Detroit managing only a field goal midway through the quarter, and as time ran down to the final minute, the Lions still needed a touchdown to overcome a 27-23 deficit. Green’s strategy seemed prescient as Detroit lined up for a fourth and 8 at the Viking 12 yard line, with 48 seconds remaining. Peete dropped back to pass, found no immediate open receiver, scrambled right, considered running for the first down marker, then threw a wobbly pass to Brett Perriman at the goal line. Perriman lunged, got a hand on the ball, and then watched it fall harmlessly to the ground behind him.
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The Metrodome crowd went wild—until the yellow flag hit the artificial turf like a wooden stake through the heart of a vampire. It was a controversial pass interference call on the Vikings’ Anthony Parker. First and goal at the one yard line ensued, with 43 seconds remaining. The Lions had no time-outs remaining, and could not play games with the clock. They banged the ball into the end zone on their first try, for a touchdown, giving them a 30-27 lead, but leaving over a half-minute for the Vikings to respond in dramatic fashion.
Alas, there were no heroics in the final moments for the home team. “Two-Minute” Tommy Kramer had retired three years earlier, and Kirk Cousins was five years old at the time. Salisbury and company were unable to fully write the script for the film we have seen twice in recent weeks for the Purple. The dominant performance over three quarters was there, the fourth quarter mistakes were there. The conservative decision-making was there. But there was no final march by the heroic Vikings though, no overtime, and, mercifully, no missed field goals either.
Also Read: The Scariest Part of Being a Vikings Fan
We’ve had our share of disappointment already in 2021, watching the Vikings lose as many as they have won, often in dramatic fashion, with thousands of Purple fans shouting obscenities at their TV sets at home. But we’ve been pretty fortunate to see a couple of remakes of the Vikings Halloween Battle of 1993, with a twist—a happy ending at the end. Two games ago, against those same Lions, and the most recent overtime battle against Carolina, many of us felt pretty dissatisfied by the fourth quarter collapses that led to the dramatic victories. But looking back to 1993, it’s a nice reminder that in the end, it’s all about the “W”.
So, yeah, we’ve seen this movie before. But with their own plot twists and variations, and that, in the end, is what makes football so much fun to watch, and our team so much fun to root for. Even if you have that haunting feeling that you’ve seen this one before, there’s always a little something to make you cheer (or make you cry) in a whole new way.
We all hope that there are no Ghosts of Halloween Past from 1993 (or anywhere else) to heap tragedy onto tonight’s All Hallow’s Eve thriller, but if it does turn out in horrifying fashion, at least you can take solace in the bowl full of fun-sized chocolate bars sitting on your coffee table.
