NFL Winners and Losers: Lions prove they’re Super Bowl contenders with clutch win

The Detroit Lions were on the road against one of two remaining undefeated teams, down 10-0 in part because of a bad decision to run a fake punt. They were facing arguably the best defense in the NFL this season.

Even after they came back to overcome that deficit, a huge fumble in the fourth quarter was returned by the Minnesota Vikings for a touchdown, giving them a late 29-28 lead.

Sunday’s game against the Vikings was big for the Lions. They didn’t want to fall two games behind in the loss column to a division rival as good as Minnesota. It’s also possible that the 2024 Lions look back on their win Sunday as something that set the tone for a championship season.

The Lions had plenty of things go against them. But with the game on the line, Jared Goff — who was close to perfect against a very good Vikings defense — drove the Lions downfield for a game-winning field goal with 15 seconds left and a massive 31-29 win.

That win will be huge in the NFC North race. It’s also a game that proved the Lions have enough heart to be a champion.

The game started with some bumps. Lions head coach Dan Campbell leaned on his highly aggressive approach and ran a fake punt at their own 33 in the first quarter. Nobody is surprised by Lions fakes anymore, and the Vikings stopped it cold. Then Aaron Jones had a 34-yard touchdown run for a 7-0 lead.

The Lions battled back. Goff kept hitting passes. His first incompletion didn’t come until midway through the third quarter, after 15 straight completions to start the game. By halftime Detroit had turned a 10-0 deficit into a 21-10 lead.

But the Vikings are a good team and a win wasn’t going to be that easy. With less than six minutes left, the game turned. David Montgomery had the ball punched out. Vikings linebacker Ivan Pace Jr. scooped up the fumble and returned it 36 yards for a touchdown. That gave Minnesota a 29-28 lead. The Lions punted after that, meaning a defense that will be without injured star Aidan Hutchinson had to get the ball back. It forced a three-and-out. Then Goff and Jahmyr Gibbs went to work, with Goff completing some big passes and Gibbs eating up yards on the ground. Goff finished a fantastic 22-of-25 for 280 yards and two touchdowns. He’s going to get some MVP buzz after another huge game.

The Lions got the go-ahead field goal with 15 seconds left and then the defense got a sack on the final play, not allowing Sam Darnold to get off a Hail Mary attempt.

Sunday’s win wasn’t easy. The Lions had many points in which they could have faded away. But that’s not what champions do. The Lions haven’t won a Super Bowl in their history, but on Sunday this Lions team showed they are within a small group of contenders this season.

Here are the rest of the winners and losers from Week 7 of the NFL season:

WINNERS

Steve Spagnuolo: The Kansas City Chiefs are a defensive team. Have been for a couple seasons.

Patrick Mahomes is still great but he’s getting a lot of help. Spagnuolo, the Chiefs’ defensive coordinator, had another great day. He out-maneuvered Kyle Shanahan, forced Brock Purdy into his worst day of the season and the Chiefs got a 28-18 win to remain the NFL’s only defeated team.

The 49ers had excuses. Deebo Samuel Sr. left the game after a few plays due to injury and Brandon Aiyuk suffered a knee injury near the end of the first half. Christian McCaffrey still hasn’t played this season. Regardless of the excuses, they’re 3-4 and not exactly what anyone thought they would be this season.

On Sunday, the Chiefs caused them to look bad. There’s no question about their status as a Super Bowl contender, and for a second straight season their all-world quarterback is only one of the main reasons.

Jordan Love: He is getting paid a lot of money, and not to pile up yards in blowouts or in the first three quarters of a game. What separates good from great quarterbacks is coming through in the clutch.

Love did that Sunday. He put together a huge eight-play, 44-yard drive in the final two minutes, giving Brandon McManus a shot at a 45-yard field goal to win it. McManus, who was signed Wednesday, came through and the Green Bay Packers had a 24-22 win over the Houston Texans.

Love had 220 yards and three touchdowns, and squeezed out a win against the Texans and C.J. Stroud, who had a surprisingly quiet 86 yard passing. Love signed a four-year, $220 million deal before the season, and we saw on Sunday why the Packers invested in him.

Amari Cooper: If you’ve watched the Cleveland Browns’ offense this season, you know what Cooper was suffering through.

And if you’ve seen the Buffalo Bills, you know what an upgrade he just experienced.

Cooper was acquired on Tuesday in a trade by the Bills and it must have been refreshing to walk into a functioning offense. Josh Allen found Cooper for a big touchdown, and that helped the Bills snap out of a sluggish start and beat the Tennessee Titans 34-10.

Cooper didn’t have a huge role just a few days after being traded, with four catches for 66 yards, but that will grow. He’s the best receiver Buffalo has and it’s not that close. He went from a Browns team that is counting down the days until it finds out its NFL Draft position to a Super Bowl contender. It’s hard to imagine a bigger shift in fortunes for a player during the season.

A healthier Seattle Seahawks team: The Seahawks got some of their defensive players back, and the results looked a lot different.

The Atlanta Falcons (4-3) continue to look like a team that got to four wins mostly because of good fortune in close games, as they were outclassed all day by the Seahawks. Seattle looked like the better team, and a way better version of itself than we saw during a three-game losing streak. Geno Smith played well, Kenneth Walker III continues to look like one of the best backs in the NFL and the Seahawks’ defense looked like it did early in the season during a fairly easy win.

The Seahawks put the game away on a defensive touchdown, when Boye Mafe sacked Kirk Cousins, and Derick Hall scooped the fumble and took it 64 yards for a score and a 31-14 lead. The Seahawks went on to win 34-14.

The Seahawks started 3-0 and then lost three in a row. Sunday, on the road against a Falcons team that was lucky to be 4-2 coming in but still not a bad team, was a test for where their season might be going. Seattle looked pretty good passing that test.

Cincinnati Bengals’ offense, finally: The Bengals got a 100-yard kickoff return for a touchdown on the opening drive of their game against the Cleveland Browns, then went into hibernation for the rest of the half.

The Bengals, who didn’t look great on offense in a win last week against the Giants, didn’t score again the rest of the first half. They led just 7-6 at halftime.

Eventually it got going. Joe Burrow threw a couple of touchdowns, one on a great back-shoulder throw to Ja’Marr Chase and another to Tee Higgins, and they pulled away for a 21-14 win over a Browns team that was not competitive with Dorian Thompson-Robinson replacing an injured Deshaun Watson at quarterback.

The Bengals have been lethargic most of the season and Sunday wasn’t their most impressive performance either. But they’ve clawed back to a 3-4 record and perhaps can figure out their issues and make a run.

New England Patriots: Yes, the Patriots lost and their head coach Jerod Mayo called them soft. Not great. But Drake Maye showing why he was the third pick of the NFL Draft matters more than anything this season, and the Patriots have to be pleased with what they’re seeing.

Maye completed 26 of 37 passes for 276 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions in the 32-16 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars in London. Maye had several impressive throws and also keeps showing that he has plus athleticism.

There was worry that the Patriots were bad around Maye and that’s why he should sit most of this season. Those deficiencies still exist on their roster, but Maye looks good in spite of it.

So Jacksonville got the win, improving to 2-5 and saving Doug Pederson’s job for the moment. But the Patriots can feel good about what they saw too, at least on offense. That’s the biggest thing for them the rest of the season.

LOSERS

Antonio Pierce: Part of being a good head coach is figuring out the puzzle of when to go for it and when to kick.

Pierce hasn’t done a great job of that this season. On Sunday, trailing 20-12 with just under three minutes left against the Los Angeles Rams, Pierce had his team on the field to go for it on fourth-and-goal from the 4-yard line. Then there was a false start. And Pierce went for a 27-yard field goal, still leaving the Raiders in need of a touchdown.

The Raiders used their timeouts to get the ball back, but it was on their own 11-yard line with 1:39 left. Getting a touchdown from the 9-yard line had a better shot than going 89 yards with no timeouts. Gardner Minshew II threw an interception on his third play of the drive and that was the game. The Rams won 20-15.

The Raiders are 2-5. Sometimes the difference between a win and a loss in a competitive NFL is a game management decision. Pierce didn’t make a good one Sunday.

Carolina Panthers: There are other teams stuck with just one win, but there’s little debate anymore about the worst team in the NFL.

The Panthers are an absolute mess. Jayden Daniels left Sunday’s game after just 6 passing yards due to a rib injury, and the Washington Commanders still put up 40 points in a 40-7 win.

The Panthers are probably going to turn back to Bryce Young at some point, and it’s doubtful he’ll fix anything. Nothing will improve a Panthers defense that has been the worst in football. There have been plenty of injuries on that side of the ball but the depth the Panthers’ defense has reached is still stunning. The Panthers should be fortunate they got one win this season because there’s no guarantee they’ll get another one.

Joe Schoen: Every time Saquon Barkley has done something this season, we’re reminded of a clip from “Hard Knocks” this summer when Giants co-owner John Mara tells Schoen, his team’s general manager, that he would have a hard time sleeping if Barkley went to the Philadelphia Eagles after the Giants were lukewarm on re-signing him.

It’s a lot worse for Schoen when Barkley was doing something at MetLife Stadium not in a Giants’ uniform.

Barkley, who signed with the Eagles and is having a very good season, had a monster performance in his first game against the Giants. Barkley had 176 rushing yards and a touchdown, and the Eagles’ defense shut down the Giants in a 28-3 Philadelphia win.

Barkley probably wasn’t going to transform a bad Giants team this season. But seeing him make big plays had to sting the Giants. Mara won’t sleep well after that either.

All the QBs in Dolphins-Colts: Anthony Richardson’s Indianapolis Colts ended up getting a win, but that was mostly because the combination of Tyler Huntley and Tim Boyle couldn’t do anything for the Miami Dolphins.

The difference is, Huntley and Boyle are injury replacements, not a former No. 4 overall draft pick.

Richardson continues to struggle in the passing game. He completed 10 of 24 passes for 129 yards and continued to be the least accurate quarterback in the NFL. The Colts squeezed out a 16-10 win but it was in spite of their struggles on offense. They were lucky to be playing the Dolphins without Tua Tagovailoa.

The Dolphins are hoping that Tagovailoa returns soon. It has been reported he could be back in Week 8. The Dolphins desperately need that because they don’t resemble a professional offense without him.

Huntley got injured Sunday, Boyle replaced him and it didn’t matter. Miami’s quarterbacks have turned Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle (two catches for 19 yards combined) into ghosts. That’s hard to do.

There’s hope for the Dolphins’ offense when Tagovailoa returns. The Colts hope that there are better days ahead with their quarterback too.