Jeff Diamond: Reactions After Vikings Get A Critical Win in Chicago
Four weeks ago the Vikings beat the Packers 34-31 in an exciting back-and-forth divisional battle full of offensive fireworks. On Monday night, Vikings gained a necessary 17-9 win over their other arch-rival—the Bears—in a mistake-filled (mostly by Chicago), old-time Black-and-Blue division defensive struggle that hardly could be called exciting.
Bottom line—they’re both the best kind of victories, in the NFC North, and they count the same—a W, which is all that matters. After all the close games this season, it was nice—and relaxing for the Vikings and their fans–to experience a 14 point lead late in the fourth quarter. And as I’ve often said, there’s no such thing as an ugly win in the NFL, especially in a division road game.
I thought it would be a difficult night for the Minnesota offense to win once I saw that Vikings-killer Akiem Hicks was coming off an ankle injury to play for the first time in a month along with Chicago’s leading tackler Roquan Smith (hamstring). Throw in the fact that Adam Thielen’s ankle was not yet ready for prime time and the game was in cold Soldier Field (a difficult place for the Vikings over the years) so I figured it would be a struggle offensively even with the Bears secondary missing all four starters due to Covid.
So the onus was on the Minnesota defense to play better than they have lately and make things difficult for rookie QB Justin Fields. Fortunately for their playoff lives, the Vikings D delivered their best performance of the season during the win, forcing three turnovers and stopping the Bears three other times on downs. Dalvin Cook fought hard for 89 rushing yards on 28 carries and on the rare occasions that he wasn’t being pressured by Hicks and Robert Quinn (two sacks each), Kirk Cousins was able to throw two touchdown passes.
At 7-7, the Vikings are in a battle for the final NFC playoff spot with New Orleans and either Washington or Philadelphia heading into a day-after-Christmas matchup with the L.A. Rams. It will be a game that Mike Zimmer and Company would gladly take another win—in whatever fashion.
Here are my other reactions to this critical Vikings win in Chicago
[brid autoplay=”true” video=”928976″ player=”26281″ title=”AdClipWeird%20Game” duration=”102″ description=”undefined” uploaddate=”2021-12-22″ thumbnailurl=”//cdn.brid.tv/live/partners/19439/thumb/928976_t_1640191342.png” contentUrl=”//cdn.brid.tv/live/partners/19439/sd/928976.mp4″]
