What To Watch For: Patriots vs. Vikings on Thanksgiving night
BOSTON -- About a month ago, things looked dicey for the New England Patriots.
They were coming off an embarrassing loss at home, on Monday Night Football, to the Bears of all teams. They had a self-inflicted quarterback controversy. It was only late October, but it felt like the entire season hung in the balance.
Since then, things have stabilized. Mac Jones has taken every snap at quarterback, and though the offense has been far from explosive, the team has won three straight games. Their defense has been lights out, allowing just 23 points over the last three games, all of which were Patriot victories.
Now, the Patriots are 6-4, firmly in the playoff picture. And the timing works out well, because America is going to get a heavy dose of New England Patriot football in the coming month. Starting Thursday night, the Patriots will be playing four straight games in prime time: at Minnesota on Thanksgiving night, at home against Buffalo on Thursday Night Football, at Arizona on Monday Night Football, then at Las Vegas on Sunday Night Football. The last game is the only one with a chance of getting flexed out of prime time, so no matter what, the nation will be seeing a lot of Mac Jones, Bill Belichick, and that nasty Patriots defense that ranks second in the NFL in points allowed.
That'll all begin on Thursday night in Minneapolis. Here's what the Patriots will need to be prepared for in that one.
Emotions
Leaving aside the personnel and the X's and O's and the game plan, there is the simple fact that football is an emotional game. And emotions can affect teams in different ways.
The Vikings have ridden an absolute roller coaster these past two weeks. They pulled off an overtime victory in Buffalo in Week 10, a game which featured a goal-line stuff, an end-zone fumble, an unforgivable officiating gaffe, and a game-sealing end-zone interception, just to highlight some of the action.
That was a massive win for the Vikings, who improved to 8-1 with that victory over a team that many have penciled in to the Super Bowl.
But the Vikings were shot down from that high a week later, as the Cowboys (coming off an emotional loss) went into Minnesota and absolutely whipped the Vikings. The Cowboys turned a 3-3 game late in the first quarter into a 40-3 butt whooping, with a large portion of the country watching in the late-afternoon window.
For as good as the Vikings felt about themselves last week, they're feeling rather angry this week. And they're eager to get back on the field to wash away Sunday's loss.
"It's just embarrassing being in that type of situation and we just didn't play good in all phases. That's what really killed us and made us act the way we're acting now," receiver Justin Jefferson said. "We've just got to get that taste out of our mouth. We didn't play good at all. We just want to get to Thursday, have a chance to get that taste out of our mouth and play better."
The Patriots have to be prepared for a Vikings team that will be hell-bent on proving Sunday was a fluke.
O-Line Problems
The Patriots have offensive line problems of their own, with injuries to David Andrews, Isaiah Wynn and Marcus Cannon (who's on IR) at the moment. But they won't be alone on Thursday night.
The Vikings lost starting left tackle Christian Darrisaw on Sunday to a concussion, and he's already been ruled out for this week's game. It was Darrisaw's second concussion in as many weeks, as he also suffered one in Buffalo.
That's a massive loss for Minnesota:
The Vikings obviously had some slight protection issues on Sunday, with the Dallas defense racking up seven sacks of Kirk Cousins. Darrisaw, clearly not himself, allowed two of those sacks, with his fellow O-linemen allowing the other five.
Certainly, the Patriots will be watching this film closely on this short week:
The likes of Matthew Judon and his NFL-leading 13 sacks has to be licking his chops for this one, as do fellow pass rushers Deatrich Wise and Josh Uche, as well as defensive backs like Kyle Dugger and Adrian Phillips.
While the Patriots are sure to have some protection issues of their own against Za'Darius Smith, Danielle Hunter and D.J. Wonnum, this game has the real potential for Kirk Cousins to be under siege for the second straight week.
And given the way the Patriots at this point in time are kind of relying on defense and special teams to generate points, a well-timed strip sack deep in Vikings territory is the type of play that could determine this game.
Elite Talent
For as much as scheme matters, and for as much as team-wide execution matters, sometimes talent wins out in the end -- especially if that talent is truly elite. And in Justin Jefferson and Dalvin Cook, the Vikings have got themselves some talent.
Jefferson showed that with his absurd performance in Buffalo, when he caught 10 passes for 193 yards and a touchdown. It was a career high in yards, but it was also Jefferson's seventh game of the year with more than 98 receiving yards. Now in his third season, and with a 1,400-yard and 1,616-yard season on his resume, Jefferson is currently seven yards shy of 1,100 yards this year, with seven games left to play. (Of note: Jefferson is dealing with a toe injury. He caught just three passes for 33 yards last week ... but the Dallas pass rush had a lot to do with that.)
In the backfield, Cook is well on his way toward earning a fourth straight Pro Bowl nod, with his 799 rushing yards, six rushing touchdowns, and 945 yards from scrimmage. He hasn't had any monster games, per se, but he ran for 119 yards and caught three passes for 27 more yards vs. Buffalo. He's really only had one clunker (a 17-yard performance in a loss to the Eagles), as the sixth-year back has just been a steady and solid contributor for the Vikings' offense.
While the Patriots will have trouble defending Cook and Jefferson all over the field, it will become critically important on third down and in the red zone. The Patriots are bad on third down (37.7 percent) and terrible in the red zone (42.9 percent), but the Vikings aren't overwhelmingly better. Minnesota is converting just 37.9 percent of third downs while reaching the end zone on just 58.3 percent of their red zone trips.
The Patriots don't have enough talent to completely stop those two players, because no team does. But on those gotta-have-it plays, when Kevin O'Connell turns to his two best players to make a play and either move the chains or cross the goal line, the Patriots' defense will have to be at its best in order to keep this game close.
Prime-Time Kirk/Can Mac Be Back?
Mac Jones was pretty good on Sunday. You'd never know it based on the scoreboard, but Jones was solid and efficient against a very good defense that was in his face all day.
Still, the quarterback has become a bit of a third-rail topic in Boston, as any compliments for his performance in a game where no offensive touchdowns were scored gets labeled as "defending" Jones or coming from a "Mac apologist." It's quite ugly out there in the world of football analysis.
This week, though, could present an opportunity for Jones to put forth a no-doubt-about-it kind of showing, as the Vikings have had a lot of trouble defending the pass. In fact, they allow the second-most passing yards per game at 267.3 per game. Despite facing some underwhelming quarterbacks along the way, opposing passers have a combined 94.7 passer rating against the Vikings this year, the 10th-highest mark allowed in the NFL.
The Vikings have countered that with some play-making, as they have made 10 interceptions (seventh-most in NFL) and they've only allowed 14 passing touchdowns. Throw in the aforementioned O-line injuries, and it won't be easy for Mac. But the opportunity to make some plays should be there.
On the other side will be Kirk Cousins. At night. Which has been a problem for him.
As a starting quarterback, Cousins is 51-31-1 in the early Sunday window of games. He's 7-15 in the late-afternoon window, and he's 10-18 in prime-time games.
With 50 touchdowns and 26 interceptions in his 28 evening games, Cousins isn't an abject disaster. But he's certainly had issues when the whole nation is watching him play football.
That held true this year, when the Vikings picked up one of their two losses on a Monday night in Philadephia in Week 2. Cousins was 27-for-46 for 221 yards with one touchdown and three picks, good for a 51.1 rating.
Cousins actually won two of his three prime-time games last year, but he did so with a 54.4 percent completion rate, averaging 162 yards per game while throwing five touchdowns and three interceptions. His rating in those three games was 74.6. He threw 28 touchdowns and four interceptions in all other games, for a 108.5 rating.
On Thursdays specifically, Cousins is 3-5 as a starter with 14 touchdowns, 11 interceptions and a 91.0 rating.
The point is, for whatever reason, when the lights are bright, Cousins hasn't typically responded well throughout his career. And now he'll be playing on Thanksgiving night, facing a Patriots defense that ranks second in sacks (behind Dallas, who had a field day on Sunday), fourth in yards allowed, ninth in pass yards allowed, and fourth in interceptions. At the very least, the Patriots will be setting out to turn the "Kirk in prime time" angle into a national talking point come Friday morning.
You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.