Its been 9 years since the Minnesota Vikings made it to the NFC Championship game. The last time the Vikings played in the Championship game it was on the road against the New York Giants in 2001. The game ended up 0-41 for the Vikings, a total embarrassment. With all of the talent the Vikings had with Culpepper, Moss, Cris Carter, and Robert Smith, the Vikings didn’t score a point. In a lot of ways this was the Vikings window closing. With all of their talent they couldn’t get past the NFC Championship game, losing only two years earlier to the Atlanta Falcons. After the devastating loss to the Giants the next couple of years the Vikings were forced to go into a rebuilding mode: Robert Smith retired, Cris Carter moved on, Kory Stringer passed away, and Dennis Green was fired. The Vikings did not return to the playoffs until January of 2005 and really have not accomplished much since their last NFC Championship game season.

So it is 2010 and there are but two teams remaining in the NFC, Saints and Vikings. The winner will go to the big game, the loser goes home. Again the Vikings are going to be playing on the road as they did against the New York Giants. The New Orleans Saints are the team that stands in the way of the Vikings making their 5th Super Bowl appearance. The Saints have shown to be a very explosive team on offense and strive on defense by the way of making turnovers. If the game was being played at home for the Vikings they would be favored to win this game. Again this week the Vikings are the underdog. However, there are a number of things that the Vikings can do to improve their chances of winning this game.

1. Do not turn the ball over. This is the most important thing that the Vikings can do to help their chances to pull off the upset. The Saints live and die off of turnovers. The Vikings must take care of the ball.

2. Get an early lead. With the noise in the dome at the loudest the Vikings must score early to take away some of the crowd noise. If the Vikings can weather the storm of the Saints offensive attack in the first few series their chances of winning increase.

3. Put pressure on Drew Brees. With the game being played in New Orleans do not expect the Viking defensive line to be as strong as last week. However, it is imperative that the Vikings put consistent pressure on Drew Brees. The New Orleans Saints lead the league offensively with most points scored and most yards gained per game. The Saints passing game is too good and the Vikings secondary is too weak to allow Drew Brees the time to makes his reads. If Brees is given time to throw play after play the Vikings will lose this game.

4. Do not allow the big play. The Saints last week were full of big touchdown plays. They had the Reggie Bush punt return, the Reggie Bush rushing touchdown, and the flea-flicker touchdown pass. The Vikings must stop the big play. The Saints are going to take their shots downfield and the Vikings must be ready for them.

So here we are 9 years later. The window has reopened and the Minnesota Vikings are loaded with talent, as are the Saints. This is another big game for the Minnesota Vikings and a big challenge against a very talented New Orleans Saints team. The Vikings can win this game and have a great opportunity to do so. What this game comes down to is “who wants it more?”

Paul Gantner

Its “Go Time” for the Minnesota Vikings. After a week off they meet a strong Cowboy team who appears to be peaking. So do the Vikings have a chance to beat the Cowboys? Not according to the national media and the sports writers. Although the Vikings are favored by 2 ½, due to home field advantage, they are looked at as the underdog. And they should be looked at as the underdog. The Cowboys are a hot team right now and have definitely played better football in the last month in comparison to the Vikings. However, the Vikings still have a good chance to win the game. There are several things that the Vikings can do in order to improve there chances at getting a victory.

1.) The Vikings need to get an early lead. The Vikings have shown late in the year that they do not do well when playing from behind. This is evident by the late year losses against the Carolina Panthers, Arizona Cardinals, and the Chicago Bears. Minnesota started slow in each of these games and did not appear to be comfortable in comeback mode. On the other side of this the Vikings have been a good frontrunner.

2.) The Vikings cannot afford to turn the ball over. Brett Favre has only had 7 interceptions this year. In 3 of their 4 losses Favre
had a total of 4 interceptions. This goes back to the first point that if the Vikings get an early lead Favre is less likely to throw an
interception. Adrian Peterson must hold on to the ball. Peterson has a terrible history of fumbling the ball.

3.) The Vikings must get to Tony Romo. A key to this is to stop the Cowboys running game and make them one dimensional. Tony Romo has been playing sensational as of late and has shown to be very elusive. The combination of Romo’s skills and a weak Vikings secondary can spell disaster for the Vikings if Romo is given time to throw. The Vikings must mix up their blitzes and put consistent pressure on Tony Romo. If not, Romo could end up with 4 touchdown passes or more.

4.) The Vikings must protect Brett Favre. The old football cliche is “it all starts up front”. Of course this cliche could apply for any football game. A good offensive line provides lanes to run through and also allows time for the quaterback to pass. A good defensive line shuts down the run and puts prerssure on the quarterback on passing downs. In Viking losses this year the offensive line struggled to protect Favre. If Favre isn’t protected and the the Vikings get behind, this game could possibly be over by halftime.

5.) Shutdown or limit Jason Witten. Witten has 94 receptions this year and is Tony Romo’s favorite receiver. With EJ Henderson out this presents a big problem for the Viking defense. Witten is the primary receiver for Romo in a lot of plays. With the combination of covering Witten and applying pressure on Romo, this could result in a “win, win” scenario for the Vikings. The Vikings cannot expect Jasper Brinkly to cover Jason Witten without any additional help.

The Minnesota Vikings haven’t won a playoff game since the 2004 season. The Vikings lost last year in the opening round of the playoffs and brought in Brett Favre this year with high expectations of at least going deep into the playoffs. This is a big game. Although the majority of the media favor the Cowboys, the Vikings still have a very good chance at winning this game. And if the Arizona Cardinals play as good as they did last week the Vikings have a chance of hosting the NFC Championship game next week. But enough with the talk and predictions, its “Go Time” for the Minnesota Vikings.

Paul Gantner

Throughtout this week it has been reported that there has been an ongoing conflict between quarterback Brett Favre and head coach Brad Childress. As reported the conflict exists from Favre calling too many audibles when Childress wants him to stick with the original play call, a power struggle if you will. It has also been reported that in the third quarter of the game against the
Panthers coach Childress wanted to sit Favre due to the fact that Childress believed the quarteback was getting banged up quite a bit. Here is my take on this.

First of all, the fact that Childress wanted to take Favre out when the Vikings were leading 7-6 is difficult to understand. The Vikings were up by one point and in no way in control of the game. This was a very important game. The Vikings needed to win this game in order to take advantage of the Saints loss and keep distance from the Eagles. Did Childress really think that Brett Favre would be ok with this?

Did Childress want to take Favre out because he thought he was taking too many shots and could possibly get injured? If this is true what does this say to Tarvaris Jackson? Maybe it says “Brett is getting beat up out there so I (Brad Childress) want you to play to protect Brett. So grab you helmet Tarvaris and go out there and let them knock you around a little bit!”.

There are a few ways to look at this. Did Childress think that Tarvaris Jackson with his scrambling abilities had a better chance to be successfull? This could possibly be true. Also did Childress believe that he had a better chance with Jackson but maybe told Favre something different in order to avoid conflict? (if this was the case that sure didn’t work out). Childress could have possibly
told Favre that he was worried about his health without revealing what he really believed. Which could have possibly been that Jackson’s style would give us a better chance to win against the Panthers. To me this seems like a more logical explanation. Either way I would be very curious to see how the game against Carolina would have turned out if Tarvaris Jackson did replace Favre.

Secondly, throughout the 2009 football season there have been multiple times that I have seen Favre audible and I was thinking “just run the ball”! Some of the audibles worked and others did not. What we will never know is what was the
original play that was called or if it would have worked? Most likely it was a run. Would Peterson have possibly broke off a big touchdown run? This will never be known.

So now the Vikings at times appear to be an unbalanced team that rely heavily on the pass. Is this the fault of Brett Favre calling too many audibles? Possibly. What we do know is that the offensive line is at fault for some of the unbalance. The lack of big 1st down runs sometimes force passing on 2nd and 3rd down. We also know that when teams like the Cardinals and Panthers shut down the pass offense the Vikings have problems moving the ball. When they are balanced, such as the Bengals game, they are a much better football team and hard to stop. After three years of watching Adrian Peterson it is clear to me that he appears to get stronger with each carry and has the ability to wear down a defense. In my opinion, Peterson should not have anything under 20 carries a game. Maybe Brad Childress has a point?

Paul Gantner

Did the Vikings celebrate winning the NFC North a little early? An hour or so before the Vikings were supposed to take the field against the Carolina Panthers the Packers lost to the Steelers giving the Vikings the NFC North title for the second year in a row. Was this a “trap game” as labeled thoughout the week? With the Saints losing the previous night and the Eagles winning earlier in the day the Vikings had everything to play for. The Vikings still had a legitimate opportunity at earning the top seed in the NFC and also needed to win to maintain distance from Philadelphia Eagles. So with everything to play for they lose 26-7 to the 5-8 Carolina Panthers. What happened?

The game looked eerily similar to the Cardinals game a couple of weeks ago, but perhaps worse. Worse in that they could not consistently stop the Carolina rushing attack. Similar in that the secondary looked poor, the rushing game was non-existant, the offensive line did not have an answer for the Carolina pass rush (especially Julius Peppers), and the Vikings did not appear to want to win the game. The Vikings did not look like an 11-2 football team who were hungry to win.

With Deangelo Williams on the sideline it appeared that the Vikings had the advantage against the rush. Unfortunately this was not the case. Poor tackling resulted in the Vikings defense allowing their first 100 yard rusher in over 30 games. Poor tackling was one of several reasons why the Vikings did not win this game.

With Jake Delhomme on the sideline it appeared that the Vikings had the advantage against the pass (well maybe not with the year that he is having). Matt Moore has only had a few starts in the NFL but did a great job at limiting mistakes and finding the open receiver. Moore did not have a spectacular game but did what was necessary to get the win. The lack of a consistent pass rush
by the Vikings resulted in Moore having plenty of time to locate his receivers. Antoine Winfield, who played spectacular last week, was burned on the three biggest Panther pass plays of the game. Two were to Steve Smith, one of which was poor tackling by Winfield after the catch.

The Vikings struggled to rush the ball effectively and protect the quarterback. Peterson or Taylor did not have a great game statistically, but it all starts up front. On a lot of the running plays Peterson was getting hit before he made it to the line of scrimmage. Peterson is a great running back but if he is not getting the blocking up front he will continue to appear ordinary. Against the Cardinals and the Panthers the offensive line got beat up pretty good. Can anyone remember the last game when Peterson rushed for more than 100 yards? But it is not all on Peterson and Taylor.

The offensive line did not protect Favre, similar to the game against the Cardinals. Favre played a decent game but was not given sufficient time to go through his progressions to pass to the open receiver. At first it was thought that Bryant McKinney was hurt when he was not in the game, but it was later learned that he was replaced because he could not stop Julius Peppers. If the
offensive line does not improve the Vikings will continue to struggle.

The last observation, and maybe the most disturbing, is that the Vikings did not appear to be motivated to win the game. They appeared lethargic and unenthusiastic. The Panthers appeared to be the playoff team. This is where Brad Childress must take responsibility for not having his team prepared to play a very important game.

So where do the Vikings go from here? The most important issue at hand is to secure the NFC second seed playoff spot. The Saints will not lose both games so the fantasy of being the NFC top seed ended when the Panthers went up 19-7. The Eagles are one game back of the Vikings and would win the tie-break and the Eagles are the hot team right now. The Vikings should not expect the Eagles to lose any of their remaining games, even playing at Dallas in the last week. If the Vikings win out the second seed is secure. The Vikings will most likely have to win out to secure the second seed. Will the Vikings make the necessary changes and get back to playing good, solid, sound football? If not expect another very early exit from the playoffs, just like last year.

Paul Gantner

The Vikings get beat 30-17 by a Cardinals team who outplayed the Viking’s in every area of the game. And truth be told, it looked like the Cardinals wanted this game a lot more than the Vikings. Blame can be placed on the Viking’s offense, defense, and special teams. This wasn’t a loss that ended in optimism for the Viking fan. This was a game that left the Viking fan wondering “where do we go from here”? Offense, defense, and special teams left no reason for the Viking fan to be optimistic.

The game started off good for the offense. The Viking’s recover a fumble on the Cardinals first series and put up a touchdown within the first few minutes of the game. Little did we know that this was going to be the best part of the evening for the Viking offense.

The Vikings could not run the ball. Peterson ended the night with 13 carries for 19 yards. The interesting thing about this statistic is that his longest run of the night was for 11 yards. So he basically had 12 carries for 8 yards. Peterson was totally shut out running the ball. Was this the fault of Peterson? Maybe the offensive line? Nevertheless the top rushing team from last year have problems, serious problems.

Favre, without a doubt, played his worse game as a Viking so far. With the Viking’s opening the third quarter down by 11 he threw his first interception of the game. Fortunately the Viking defense held the Cardinals to only a field goal. So with the Viking’s down by 14 points Favre again threw another interception. Both interceptions looked really bad and it was obvious at this point that Favre was confused and uncertain as to what to do. Favre ended the night with two interceptions but could have easily ended up with 4. Favre was 30-45 for 275 yards, with two touchdown and of course the two interceptions. Was the Cardinal defense really that good or did Favre just have a bad second half? Favre had an ok first half and had a great opportunity to tie the game at 14 right before halftime. Unfortunately the Vikings setteld for a field goal and gave the Cardinals plenty of time to score another touchdown before half.

The Viking defense was obviously outplayed by a strong Cardinal offense, especially in the first half. Kurt Warner ended the first half with three touchdowns, two to Anquan Boldin and one to Larry Fitzgerald. The secondary of the Viking’s were weak and a lot of times looked out of place. This coupled with the fact that the Cardinals did not allow a sack. Warner had plenty of time and the Viking defense paid for it. Fitzgerald and Boldin ended the night totaling 15 receptions and 3 touchdowns. The Cardinals have some excellent receivers and a possible Hall of Fame quarterback. Nevertheless, the Viking’s must be concerned about how the defense played.

The 64 yard punt return by Breaston in the first quarter totally changed the momentum of the game. With the Viking’s up 7-0 the momentum was in their hands. The punt return followed by the touchdown pass to Boldin evened things up and perhaps gave the momentum to the Cardinals. This was a concern of the special teams for the Vikings’ last year and continues to be a concern.

So the Minnesota Viking’s go to 10-2. But it is without a doubt a disappointing 10-2 after the Cardinal loss. The two games in which the Vikings lost were against teams, at that time, had winning records. All 10 of the Viking victories were against teams that had losing records. With the poor performance against the Cardinals on Sunday night one must wonder “where do we go from here?”. From the special teams, to the offense and defense, there are areas of concern. This loss against the Cardinals makes next weeks game against the Bengals all that much bigger.

Paul Gantner