Good evening, everyone. On New Year’s Day 2023, the Green Bay Packers took on the Minnesota Vikings at Lambeau Field. Entering this game, the Packers were still fighting for a chance to make the playoffs. The scenario was simple: win the last two games and hope that the Washington Commanders split their final two games. In the early window, Washington lost to Cleveland by a score of 24-10. This meant that all the Packers needed to do was to take care of business at Lambeau Field. On Sunday, that’s just what they did, winning by a wide margin against the Vikings. Here is how the game went down.
The Packers defense got off to a great start by forcing the Vikings to go three and out. Randall Cobb returned the punt to the Green Bay 22 yard line. From there, the Packers also went three and out on their first drive. Disaster nearly struck the Packers when Pat O’Donnell’s punt was blocked and the Vikings started at the one yard line. However, the Packers defense stuffed Minnesota and made them settle for a field goal. The Vikings led for only a few seconds thanks to Keisean Nixon taking the ensuing kickoff all the way for a touchdown. I went berserk during this play along with the crowd at Lambeau Field. The extra point was good, giving the Packers a 7-3 lead with 10:25 left in the first quarter. The defense responded with another three and out, which ended with an incomplete pass on third and 3 from the Minnesota 32. Keisean Nixon returned the punt to the Green Bay 38 for 10 yards. From there, the Packers offense took over. The drive looked promising at first with a 14-yard run by Aaron Jones, but it went downhill from there. On third and 1, AJ Dillon was stuffed after getting a toss from Aaron Rodgers. On fourth down, Rodgers held the ball and was sacked for a loss of 16 yards, resulting in a turnover on downs. Thankfully, the defense kept the Vikings from doing anything after that sack. On second down, Jaire Alexander mocked Justin Jefferson’s griddy celebration after forcing a pass to be incomplete. On third down, TJ Hockenson caught an 8-yard pass to set up a fourth and 2 from the Green Bay 37. On the fourth down play, Kirk Cousins threw a pass that was tipped by Rasul Douglas and picked off by Darnell Savage. Savage then took the pick all the way for a touchdown thanks to some key blocks (including a block by Preston Smith that sent Kirk Cousins to the end zone). The extra point was good by Mason Crosby, increasing the lead to 14-3 with 5:17 left in the first quarter. The Vikings then went on a drive to potentially get a score to decrease the lead. During this drive, the defense somehow allowed Kirk Cousins to scramble for a first down on a third and 11. The drive eventually stalled after the Vikings got inside the Green Bay 30. A delay of game caused a third and 6 to be a third and 11. The third down play resulted in a one yard pass play, forcing Minnesota to settle for a field goal. However, Greg Joseph’s attempt from 46 yards away went wide right, keeping the score at 14-3 with 1:37 left in the quarter. The Packers then took over at their own 36 and went on a scoring drive. This particular drive lasted nearly 7 minutes of game time and featured two key third down pass completions from Rodgers to WR Allen Lazard. Both passes were preceded by deep incomplete bombs intended for Christian Watson. The second one would’ve been a touchdown had Watson held on to the ball. The Packers managed to get all the way to the Minnesota 3 yard line before their drive stalled. They did line up to go for it on fourth down, but it was a waste due to Rodgers trying to draw the defense offsides. It didn’t work and the Packers suffered a delay of game penalty. The field goal was good from 26 yards out, increasing the lead to 14 points with 9:48 left in the first half. The Vikings tried to come back with a score, but Kirk Cousins was once again picked off by Green Bay’s defense. On first and 10 from the Green Bay 31, Kirk Cousins threw a pass that was deflected at the line of scrimmage by TJ Slaton. The ball then bounced in the air and was intercepted by safety Adrian Amos, who returned the pick to Green Bay 40 before being pushed out of bounds. From there, the Packers offense took over to get another score. It only took them 5 plays, culminating in a 21-yard touchdown pass from Aaron Rodgers to Robert Tonyan, who did his own griddy celebration after the TD catch. With 2:41 remaining, the Packers led the Vikings by a score of 24-3. The Vikings tried desperately to get a score before halftime, but their field goal attempt from 50 yards away went wide left, giving the Packers a chance to increase the lead with 36 seconds left. Despite having no timeouts, the Packers were able to get into field goal range. The 56-yard attempt by Mason Crosby hit the crossbar and bounced in for 3 more points to make it a 27-3 halftime lead.
The Packers’ first drive of the second half did not go well as they were forced to punt after 5 plays, including an incomplete deep bomb intended for Christian Watson. The punt by Pat O’Donnell was fair caught at the Minnesota 16 yard line. From there, the Vikings went on a long drive. During the drive, Kirk Cousins was able to scramble for 18 yards and a first down that got the Vikings into Green Bay territory. 4 plays after that scramble, the Vikings had the ball at the Green Bay 15. They were about to score when Kenny Clark stripped Kirk Cousins off the ball and recovered the fumble at the 24 yard line with 7:06 left in the third quarter. With that fumble recovery, the Packers took over and looked to seal the win. The ensuing drive lasted 12 plays and took off 7 minutes and 16 seconds off the game clock. 7 first downs were converted during this drive, including clutch catches by Watson, Randall Cobb, and Allen Lazard. Late in the drive, on a third and 4 from the Minnesota 17, Aaron Rodgers caught the defense with too many men. The pass went incomplete, but the Packers got a free first down thanks to the penalty. AJ Dillon finished the drive with a 2-yard touchdown run that was followed by an awesome touchdown celebration. AJ Dillon was conducting an orchestra while several players chimes in with their air instruments. Aaron Rodgers played air guitar, Aaron Jones did a violin, David Bakhtiari did a saxophone, and Josh Myers did the cowbell. That whole celebration was hilarious and awesome. The extra point was good, giving the Packers a 34-3 lead just into the fourth quarter. The Packers then got the ball right back after Kirk Cousins was picked off by Rudy Ford, who returned the pick to the Minnesota 45. From there, the offense went down the field and added another touchdown. The touchdown scramble by Aaron Rodgers was set up by a 24-yard catch and run by Robert Tonyan that got Green Bay into goal-to-go territory. Rodgers made a man miss during the TD run and did a belt afterwards. With that touchdown, Rodgers’ day was over as the Packers went up 41-3. The rest of the game was pretty much garbage time. The Vikings were able to get two touchdowns during this stretch, but the Packers had the game won anyway by a final score of 41-17. With the win, the Packers are now 8-8 and one win away from making the playoffs.
(Here are the highlights of the game, provided by the NFL's YouTube page. Click on "Watch on YouTube.)
Offensively, the Packers played a much better game than their last game at Lambeau. Aaron Rodgers didn’t have a fantastic game (especially in the deep passing game), but he made the clutch throws that were needed to convert third downs and get the Packers into scoring range without committing a turnover. He made a defender miss on his touchdown scramble and had a great role in AJ Dillon’s TD celebration with his air guitar (in fact, every part of that celebration was awesome). Speaking of Dillon, he and Aaron Jones combined for a total of 152 rushing yards. Aaron Jones himself had a day, going for 111 yards on the ground and helping the Packers control the time of possession battle (plus he went over 1000 rushing yards for the third time in his career). Allen Lazard led the receivers with 5 catches for 59 yards, while Robert Tonyan had 3 catches for 52 yards and a touchdown. It helped that the offensive line performed very well on Sunday, other than that one sack. Former Packer Za’Darius Smith had nothing on the day and went back to the locker room without shaking any hands (he didn’t shake hands at the coin toss either). I applaud the efforts of the whole offensive line, including David Bakhtiari and Elgton Jenkins, for making sure that Rodgers had time to throw. The game plan was executed well, even with a couple of bad possessions and a failed red zone trip resulting in a field goal. They need to continue that next week against Detroit.
On defense, the Packers played a fantastic game. The biggest achievement was limiting Justin Jefferson to only 1 catch for 15 yards. Jaire Alexander traveled with him for basically the whole game before garbage time happened (he had some help though). Jaire even did the griddy dance after a pass breakup intended for Jefferson (thank goodness that wasn’t a penalty). Jefferson was frustrated all day, even hitting an official with his helmet after an interception (he was lucky that he wasn’t kicked out). He also got into a shoving match on the Packers sideline. Thank goodness the Packers kept their cool there. Kirk Cousins was intercepted three times, including Darnell Savage’s 75 yard pick six that broke the game open. In addition to the interceptions, Cousins was sacked twice. Justin Hollins got one and Kenny Clark strip-sacked him when the Vikings were threatening to score in the third quarter. The running game was kept in check, especially in the goal to go situation that occurred after the blocked punt. It was weird that Cousins scrambled for two first downs on Sunday. Joe Barry’s unit played well other than in garbage time. I have to give everyone credit on Sunday. They need to be ready for anything next week.
On Special Teams, the only bad thing that happened was the blocked punt early in the game. Thankfully, the defense didn’t allow a touchdown after that. There were no fumbles or penalties on Special Teams. The blocking was fantastic on Keisean Nixon’s TD return. He had a big hole and only had to stiff-arm the kicker. It was the first TD kickoff return since rookie WR Randall Cobb against the Saints in the 2011 season opener at Lambeau. It’s safe to say that the touchdown gave the Packers all of the momentum that carried them to the dominant victory. On the other side, a couple of big returns were allowed, but no touchdowns were scored by the Vikings on Special Teams. Pat O’Donnell’s other punt attempt was inside the Minnesota 20 yard line, and he, along with everyone else, made sure to every kick by Mason Crosby was clean and good. Crosby got a lucky bounce on his 56-yard FG attempt as the clock expired in the first half. Rich Bisaccia got his unit to play well once again, even with the blocked punt being the only blemish. They need to be ready for anything next week against the Lions.
Overall, this was a fantastic victory for the Packers as they blew out the Vikings. The game was never close after the kickoff return TD by Nixon. The Packers have all of the momentum now heading into the final week of the season. Next week, they play the Detroit Lions at Lambeau Field on Sunday Night Football. Regardless of whether the Lions have anything to play for or not, the Packers need to be ready for anything. In the meantime, I hope you all have a great week. Happy 2023. Go Pack Go!
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