A Return To Their Identity Sparked A Return To Form For Lions
Credit: Audrey Richardson via Imagn Images
For one week, the Detroit Lions didn’t look like themselves. The Buffalo Bills raced up and down Ford Field, handing the Lions their first loss in three months. Their defense was battered. David Montgomery appeared to be lost for the season. Dan Campbell compared it from going to filet mignon to moldy bread.
And all that disappeared the moment they hit the field again.
After a week of the national media worrying, the Lions went out and played their game. They took their turn racing up and down the turf at Soldier Field. They battered Chicago both physically and mentally, getting back on track with a 34-17 win.
These kind of swings happen in the NFL. One week, you look like a Super Bowl contender. The next? Your fans are Googling mock drafts. But as the Lions gear up for another run in the playoffs, there’s one thing that is for certain: The Lions got here because of their identity, and they need to ride it more than ever.
Everybody knows how the Lions play football. Campbell set the tone by proclaiming his team was going to eat kneecaps and carried it through a run to the NFC Championship Game last season. This team is an unhinged masterpiece, like your neighbor who clears his snow with a flamethrower, and it’s a big reason for their success.
Detroit won 12 of their first 13 games by establishing their brand of football. They split their first two games with the Los Angeles Rams and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, then gutted it out for two tough wins over the Arizona Cardinals and Seattle Seahawks.
After their bye week, they were off like a Mustang in a drag race, out-scoring their next seven opponents 256 to 101. They hung tough in road games against the Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers to gain leverage in the NFC North, did it again at the Houston Texans, and walloped everyone else.
But sometimes when you floor it, you wind up blowing a gasket. Aidan Hutchinson’s broken leg was a tough blow for Detroit, but they recovered. But when Alim McNeill’s torn ACL, Carlton Davis III’s fractured jaw, and Khalil Dorsey‘s broken leg arrived in the Bills’ loss, it looked like the culmination of a trail of parts falling on the highway. It appeared like the Lions’ best path would be to pump the brakes, get back to health, and then make their final push to the playoffs.
But that’s not how this team operates, and it showed in Sunday’s win in Chicago.
The Lions sped out of the gates, jumping out to a 20-0 lead. At one point, the Lions toyed with the Bears, running a trick play where Jared Goff appeared to fumble the snap before throwing a wide-open touchdown pass to Sam LaPorta. Jahmyr Gibbs thrived with a career-high 27 touches, running for 109 yards and a touchdown while adding four catches for 45 yards.
The hits don’t stop there. Jameson Williams had one of the best games of his career, catching five passes for 143 yards and a touchdown while Amon-Ra St. Brown caught six passes for 70 yards in a touchdown. With Goff throwing for 336 yards, it was all gas for the Lions and the Bears were completely unable to do a thing about it.
Falling 20-0 to any team is a less-than-ideal situation no matter who you are playing, but it’s worse when the team you’re playing is trying to beat you by as many points as possible. That killer instinct is the secret sauce, and they didn’t retreat from it for a moment.
The Lions may never have the personnel to play the type of defense they want. But they can make up for it by throwing the kitchen sink and possibly the refrigerator at their opponents. Campbell made it clear in his postgame press conference that needs to happen for this team to succeed. “I wanted to see us play Detroit football, and I wanted to win,” the coach said. “That was it. I gave no other stipulations.… I just wanted to see our identity take shape and I wanted to win this game, and we did that.”
Looking around the NFC, it might be the best identity to have. The Philadelphia Eagles’ identity is as a highly combustible group. The Vikings’ identity is calmly making the right plays at the right time. The Lions just want to run all of them over, which is ideal, given they’ll have to do just that to get to the Super Bowl.
Maybe that strategy puts them in the winner’s circle, and maybe they wind up upside-down in the ditch. But it’s the way the Lions play, and there’s no reason to change that now.
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