Sunday’s Vikings win followed a familiar script.
The team has opened the year with a 7-1 record because they have consistently made more plays late in games than their opponents. They scored the final 13 points in Washington on Sunday and wound up with a 20-17 win that marked the fourth time that they have come from behind in the final 15 minutes to win a game this season.
Minnesota has scored 70 points in the fourth quarter overall and head coach Kevin O’Connell said on Monday that the late game heroics have provided the team with confidence that they can “consistently win close games” in the final minutes.
“Ultimately, you hate to continue to put yourselves in positions where you need to come from behind and win, but at least we know we’ve kind of removed all doubt and have a belief in ourselves that we can go get those wins when we have to know,” O’Connell said, via the team’s website. “Like I said, can we have the type of preparation and the type of performance where we don’t need to do that? That’s ultimately what our job is as coaches, to keep pushing our guys. We’ve got great leadership that knows where we’re headed, hopefully as a team. We’re going to need to play a little more distant throughout games and put it all together as a football team.”
The Vikings face teams with winning records in each of their next four games and they’ll be hoping to ride the belief they have in themselves to more wins whether they are blowouts, close games or something in between.
