DETROIT – There was one play in particular that turned the tide against the Detroit Lions in their playoff loss to the Commanders, according to Dan Campbell.
After a 15-2 regular season, the Lions earned the No. 1 seed in the NFC and a bye through the wildcard round of the playoffs. They were heavy favorites in their divisional round game against the Washington Commanders and widely expected to make the Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history.
But it all slipped away Saturday night at Ford Field, when the Lions turned the ball over five times and allowed 45 points in a blowout loss.
Detroit made so many uncharacteristic mistakes in that game. Jared Goff, a veteran quarterback, turned the ball over four times. Ben Johnson had perhaps his worst game calling plays on offense. A costly 12-man penalty robbed the defense of its final chance to make a stand.
But of all those mishaps, one stood out to Campbell: The first-quarter fumble by Goff.
“Two weeks ago, Washington plays Tampa Bay, and Tampa’s beginning to try to take control of that game,” Campbell said. “They’re up four points, and they fumbled in backed-up territory and Washington gets it. That really was -- you have an ability to go up two scores, and all of a sudden: whoa, you’re down.
“That kind of happened to us on the first turnover. We have the chance to go up 14-3 potentially, and we fumble that ball, they go all the way down -- it just kind of, it begins to change the narrative of where you’re going.”
Campbell’s right: The Lions were going to go up 14-3. We could all see it. After marching 71 yards on six plays on their previous drive, the Lions needed just five plays to get into the Washington red zone once again.
If they had picked up that first down, they would have likely been just a few plays away from a two-score lead. And the Lions were nearly impossible to catch from behind this year.
Instead, the Commanders took the lead 11 plays later.
“Then they get some long drives -- that one in the third quarter, 8 and a half minutes, 15 plays, and now all of a sudden you look up and you’re down two scores,” Campbell said.
You can watch Campbell’s full briefing here:
