This was certainly an interesting game to watch, good and bad. There's reason to believe the team may be pretty good after all, given a close win over a good team and some factors affecting the margin of victory in this game.
The offense was anemic, coming up with 6 points through three quarters of football. Most series followed a predictable pattern: on first down, run between the tackles, and since our running game sucks and the Panthers were cued to the run, little or no gain. Second and long, Johnson drops back to pass, somebody blows their assignment and Johnson gets sacked. Then it's on to third and very long, and the Vikings don't convert. The story really was the failure of what should be a good offensive line, other than during the Vikings' first drive of the game, to provide holes for the running game or protection for the passing game. Reinforcing my observation about the Panthers anticipating certain plays, whenever the Vikings broke the pattern, like a quick throw to a wide out on first down, running on second and long, they got some solid results. The other consideration is that the offense, while they didn't score, did come up with 400 yards of total offense, including 78 yards on the final scoring drive in OT, and held the ball longer than the Panthers, even though they didn't do a lot with it. Drives stalled in the Panthers half of the field, and the 50-yard blocked field goal seemed symbolic of the offense for most of the day.
Considering the narrow margin for error allowed by our lack of offensive output and the time the defense spent on the field I never thought they'd hold up through four quarters. They certainly got beat on a lot of plays, but they consistently came up with stops all day, and deserve the lion's share of the credit for this win, by holding the Panthers to 13 points. The offense deserves more credit than they'll get for gaining some yards, because the short field the special teams gave the Panthers every possession didn't help either unit too much either. The defense also had a lot of near interceptions and recovered fumbles only to have them taken away by the zebras... they were around the ball the whole game, and were getting to Delhomme, so they showed even more than what's on the stat sheet.
The only way to really win a game where you can't score is turnovers, and while both teams turned the ball over exactly once, the Vikings capitalized on theirs. The defense stopped the Panthers cold after Johnson threw his first interception of the year, but when the Panthers (following a 3-and-out, -9 yard drive by the Vikings) came up with the great idea to throw a lateral on a punt return and coughed up the ball, the Vikings took advantage of the possession in Panthers territory. Trailing 13-6 and setting up for a field goal, the holder Chris Kluwe flipped the ball up to Ryan Longwell who made what was described by fellow fans as a "not terribly masculine" pass to tight end Richard Owens who bulled in for a touchdown to tie the game. It's been a long time since I've seen a Vikings team successfully use misdirection, instead of just being stymied by it, but part of the fun of the record-setting '98 offense was the use of plays like the flea flicker, coming out of the huddle and having the QB line up as a receiver with the snap going directly to 3rd down back David Palmer, that kind of thing.
The other reason to take a lot of positives out of a close game is that hopefully we won't get this officiating crew again for a while. It was like playing Duke or something the sheer number of phantom penalties, inconsistent non-calls, and the bizarre rulings that came out of instant replay challenges, all of which served to kill Vikings drives and sustain Panthers drives. The refs aren't supposed to overturn on the field rulings except with clear, incontrovertible evidence of error, so whenever they do and still get it wrong, it really smacks of bias... three plays were reviewed, two rulings upheld and one overturned, all against the Vikings, all completely mysterious to anybody watching the same replay on the big screen. I don't think it's right to claim one bad decision by a ref determines the course of a game, but the consistent non-calls on face-mask violations by Panthers while calling an unusually high number on Vikings defenders, ignoring holding by Panthers players directly in front of officials, as well as the unusual number of calls where the official closest to the play saw nothing wrong only to have a flag thrown by a guy halfway down the field, really was atrocious. I don't mind watching my team losing at football, I mind watching them lose a popularity contest with referees, who weigh reputation more heavily than the game in front of them. Sure the Panthers can get the benefit of the doubt playing the Vikings based on the last few years, but there's no way Delhomme throws an incomplete pass while falling under a pile of linemen, and not only does the umpire think it's a fumble and calls it one, Delhomme thinks it's a fumble and doesn't argue the call, but the ref sees incontrovertible evidence beyond the shadow of a doubt they're both wrong when he watches the video tape and overturns the call on that basis.
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