GLENDALE, Ariz. — Sam Darnold and the Minnesota Vikings were mired in a miserable moment, badly failing a legitimacy test on the national stage. And yet, with just under 13 minutes remaining in Monday night’s first-round playoff clash with the Los Angeles Rams, the Vikings — among the more surprising 14-win teams in NFL history — still harbored hope of pulling out their most stunning victory of all.
Trailing by 18 points and facing a third-and-8 from the Rams’ 37-yard line, Minnesota coach Kevin O’Connell drew up a play he believed had touchdown potential. Two swift receivers, All-Pro Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison, would be running deep routes on the right side of the field. At the very least Darnold, who had already taken six sacks, needed to avoid losing yards; that way, O’Connell could go for it on fourth down or send on the field-goal team to try to make it a two-possession game.
“Look for Justin,” O’Connell told his quarterback over the headset. “Then look for Jordan. If you don’t like what you see, throw it out of bounds.”
We can’t be sure exactly what Darnold saw — Ghosts? Millions of dollars evaporating before his eyes? — but it wasn’t Addison running free. The second-year wideout was streaking down the sideline after feigning an out route, a move that turned around rookie safety Kamren Kinchens and left him trailing badly. Darnold, after taking a shotgun snap, looked right, pumped once, backed up to avoid a pass rusher and drifted to his left.
After holding the ball for nearly seven seconds, Darnold finally ducked for cover as L.A. defenders Michael Hoecht and Braden Fiske plowed him to the turf at midfield, leaving his head facing the opposite end zone. Now it was fourth-and-21 and O’Connell chose to punt — on the next play and, essentially, on the season.
And just like that, the Vikings’ once bustling dream of winning the franchise’s first Super Bowl went poof in the desert night.
Hoecht throws up the “LA” after the Rams latest sack
📺: #MINvsLAR on ESPN/ABC
📱: Stream on @NFLPlus and ESPN+ pic.twitter.com/iWM1Pofp0U— NFL (@NFL) January 14, 2025
This may have been a neutral-site game, relocated from Los Angeles because of the horrific wildfires that have engulfed the region for the past week, but it wasn’t a fair fight. The fourth-seeded Rams, who won four fewer games than the fifth-seeded Vikings during the regular season, sent them into a tenuous offseason with a 27-9 beatdown that made O’Connell’s team look like poseurs.
“People thought we were gonna win six games this year, and we surprised everybody by winning 14,” Jefferson said afterward as he stood stoically at his locker at State Farm Stadium, typically the domain of the Arizona Cardinals. “The outside world, they’re gonna talk. All we can do is look forward and try to better ourselves and prepare ourselves for these types of moments.”
Coupled with the 31-9 defeat to the Detroit Lions eight nights earlier that cost the Vikings a chance at the NFC’s No. 1 seed, this final image of the men in purple-and-white was a jarring one. Yes, they won nine consecutive games between Halloween and New Year’s, but the Vikings and their seemingly revived quarterback looked completely vacant when it counted most.
Was it all a Minnesota Mirage?
“I don’t know, man,” outside linebacker Jonathan Greenard said, punctuating his words with a hearty laugh. “You play like this, you leave that up for questioning. In these type of games, you’ve got to handle your business. It can be a wake-up call to some and motivation to others — an understanding of what it takes to play big-time ball against good teams.”
Echoed safety Josh Metellus: “That’s what happens when you play good football teams in games like this. If you don’t show up, start fast and do all the little things we talk about every day, this happens. We did it 14 times the right way. We didn’t do it in the last two, and you saw what happened.”
If the Vikings appeared unprepared for the magnitude of the moment, well, the Rams had something to do with that. L.A. coach Sean McVay, O’Connell’s former boss, did a masterful job of keeping his team focused during an emotionally jarring week in which he was one of 30 coaches and players forced to evacuate their homes.
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The Rams improbably went from 1-4 to the NFL postseason. Then disaster struck their city
Predictably, McVay crafted a savvy offensive game plan. Meanwhile, his first-year defensive coordinator, Chris Shula, came up with a series of exotic blitzes — some of them featuring delayed rushes by cornerbacks and safeties, with front-seven players dropping into coverage to compensate — designed to keep Darnold off balance.
The Rams’ relentless five-man front (one of their usual packages on passing downs) did more than that. L.A. repeatedly knocked Darnold off his feet, sacking him nine times for 82 yards, including one by cornerback Ahkello Witherspoon that forced a fumble and produced rookie linebacker Jared Verse’s 57-yard scoop-and-score that gave the Rams a 17-3 lead with 4:35 remaining in the first half.
JARED VERSE SCOOP AND SCORE!
📺: #MINvsLAR on ESPN/ABC
📱: Stream on @NFLPlus and ESPN+ pic.twitter.com/bXLHmOUaQW— NFL (@NFL) January 14, 2025
When Matthew Stafford (19-for-27, 209 yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions) found tight end Davis Allen for a 13-yard score with 15 seconds in the half, the Vikings were in a massive hole. The Rams weren’t inclined to let them out, and closed them out accordingly, meaning they’ll hit the road again to face the second-seeded Philadelphia Eagles in Sunday’s divisional-round game.
The Vikings, conversely, will jump headlong into an offseason of uncertainty, beginning with some intrigue — and potential messiness — surrounding the sport’s two marquee roles.
Will this coach and quarterback duo stay together? Could both O’Connell and Darnold be gone? It’s unlikely, but not impossible.
O’Connell, who was McVay’s offensive coordinator when the Rams defeated the Cincinnati Bengals in Super Bowl LVIII, transformed the Vikings’ culture after taking over as head coach in 2022. His rookie season played out something like this one did: After going 13-4 to surprisingly capture the NFC North title in 2022, Minnesota got bounced in the first round by the New York Giants.
This year, coming off a 7-10 season, the Vikings weren’t expected to do much, either. After quarterback Kirk Cousins left during free agency, Minnesota signed Darnold — the 2018 No. 3 pick who had fizzled out in stints as a starter for the New York Jets and Carolina Panthers — to a one-year deal as a stopgap and drafted Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy with the 10th pick as the heir apparent.
However, after McCarthy suffered a season-ending knee injury during the preseason, Darnold, Brock Purdy’s backup last year with the San Francisco 49ers, stepped up and began to fulfill his promise. He was a legitimate MVP candidate until his brutal outing against the Lions to close the regular season.
On Monday, with money on the line, Darnold (25-of-40, 245 yards, one TD, one interception) crapped out. Sure, Minnesota’s blocking could have been better, but the sack barrage was on the quarterback, too. The 82 lost yards were the most for a quarterback in a postseason game during the Super Bowl era and the most in any game since Cam Newton lost 91 on nine sacks against the Eagles on Nov. 10, 2014.
Darnold, who while mic’d up during a 2019 game infamously said he was “seeing ghosts” (for what it’s worth, he also claimed to have had a supernatural experience while staying in Niners teammate George Kittle’s poolhouse in 2023), definitely wasn’t surveying the field like a savvy veteran.
Will the Vikings chalk that up to a quarterback having jitters in his first playoff start and trying to negotiate a lucrative long-term deal, or will they move on and turn things over to McCarthy? While they’ll strongly consider placing the franchise tag on Darnold before the start of free agency to keep their options open, this could play out a lot of different ways.
Sam Darnold lost 82 yards while taking nine sacks — and that can’t all be blamed on the offensive line. (Christian Petersen / Getty Images)
A related and potentially more pressing question concerns O’Connell’s contract status, which should soon reach an inflection point. Having gambled by electing not to extend him a year ago — only to see him produce a regular season that could net him NFL Coach of the Year honors — Vikings owners Zygi and Mark Wilf have lost leverage as he heads into the final year of his deal. Then again, O’Connell may have lost a little bit of leverage Monday night, too.
After watching Mike McCarthy’s situation unravel with the Dallas Cowboys in the hours before Monday’s game, it’s highly unlikely O’Connell would be content heading into 2025 as a lame duck. With multiple teams reportedly having expressed interest in trading for O’Connell, he’ll likely want clarity soon. Either he’ll get a big raise and long-term extension, or it’s plausible he’ll pressure the organization to set him free.
“There’s just a lot of uncertainty,” running back Aaron Jones said. “It just sucks because teams like this don’t come often. Everybody has a sense that they let their brothers down, and we know things won’t be the same.”
Jones is one of more than a dozen key Vikings with expiring contracts, a group that includes cornerbacks Byron Murphy Jr. and Stephon Gilmore, safeties Camryn Bynum and Harrison Smith, defensive linemen Jonathan Bullard and Jerry Tillery and offensive linemen Cam Robinson and Dalton Risner.
Minnesota could also lose highly regarded defensive coordinator Brian Flores, whose innovative, blitz-happy schemes have made him a candidate for several head-coaching openings.
“We don’t know what the future holds,” Bynum said, shaking his head for emphasis. “It’s one of those seasons you never want to end, and you hate to watch it slip in between your hands, and you can’t do anything to get it back.
“As a competitor, that’s what drives you crazy. You’ll think of this forever, because you had a great regular season — but they’ll remember you for this.”
(Top photo of Kevin O’Connell: Christian Petersen / Getty Images)
