Detroit Lions Update: Playoffs?

It’s hard to believe that it’s already December. It feels like yesterday when I started college, and now my first semester is almost over. This is just amazing to me, but there’s something that truly is beyond belief. The NFL season has only three weeks left until the playoffs begin!! I can’t even begin to describe how fast the year has gone by. I remember watching the Lions play the first Monday Night Football game of the year, and now they’re in the middle of a playoff race with 8 contenders fighting it out for 6 spots. Before I discuss who the other teams that Detroit must deal with for the next month, let me start out by discussing how week 14 played out. 

This week, the Lions played host to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, a rebuilding franchise who tried to play the role of spoiler for Detroit’s season. In this game, the Bucs had nothing to lose, while the Lions had virtually everything to gain. In games like these, it’s the special players that need to step up and give their team the advantage. With this in mind, who better than both Matthew Stafford and Calvin Johnson to carry Detroit to victory. Making sure that no upset-of-the-year game would occur, Stafford lit up Tampa’s Defense, throwing for 311 yards, along with three touchdowns. Johnson would be his main target, as Megatron caught 8 catches for 158 total yards, one of them being a 6 yard touchdown reception.

With the offense firing on all cylinders, the league’s top defense would slam the door shut on the opposition. They intercepted Tampa’s quarterback Josh McCown twice, and also forced him to fumble the ball, which gave the Lions a boost of motivation. When your defense is playing at the level Detroit’s has the past two weeks, it becomes fairly simple to get a win. That’s exactly what happened, as Detroit won 34-17.

There are only two games left on the Detroit Lion’s schedule, and there’s nothing easy about it. Next week they travel to Chicago to take on the Bears, a rival that would love nothing more than to spoil Detroit’s dream season. If we’re fortunate enough to escape with a win, it might clinch us a playoff berth for the first time in three years. However, if the Lions want to make a statement on the rest of the NFL, then the last week of the season would be the perfect opportunity. Detroit will travel to Lambeau Field to face off against the Green Bay Packers, arguably the best team in football. A main reason why is because of the play of their quarterback Aaron Rodgers, an easy choice for the MVP award. As of right now, Detroit’s tied with Dallas and Seattle with a 9-4 record. The problem is that there are two wild card spots, which means one team will be left out. As of now, Detroit would be in because Dallas beat Seattle in week 5, which gives them a tiebreaker. That’s what it looks like right now, but many things can happen in the next few weeks. We’ll see what happens, but until that time, GO LIONS!!