Tag: Jahmyr Gibbs

Five reasons the Lions won OT opener against Stafford and the Rams

DETROIT — Coach Dan Campbell knew it would be a hard-fought season opener and who would doubt him. His Detroit Lions squeaked by with a 26-20 overtime win against the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday night at Ford Field in a nationally televised game.

Hard-fought? Absolutely.

Perfect? Not even close.

“We eventually found a rhythm. We did what we had to do. I said early in the week the team that makes the most mistakes is the team that usually loses these early games and we made one less mistake,’’ Campbell said.

Obviously happy with the win over a solid Rams team, Campbell and the team know they have to improve. 

“We’ll get better, we’ll get in a better flow on both sides of the ball, we will,’’ Campbell said.

Five of the top reasons the Lions won:

ONE: After kicking a late field goal to tie the game and get to overtime, the Lions won the toss. All they had to do to win was score a touchdown on that first drive. Jared Goff and RB David Montgomery put on a show with an 8-play, 70-yard scoring drive. Montgomery carried five times for 45 yards including the 1-yard touchdown. Goff called him a battering ram. “Just hand it to him, he did the rest. It was fun watching him catch his second win in overtime, the offensive line too,’’ Goff said. 

TWO: Wide receiver Jameson Williams won a game ball for his five catches for 121 yards and a 13-yard run. It was his first ever – didn’t even get one at Alabama. “This might not leave my hands, I might sleep like this,’’ said the speedy Williams who scored on a 52-yard pass play.

Just starting his third season, it seemed like a breakout game but Williams insists he’ll get better. That’s exactly what Campbell said too. He’s proud of Williams and said the best part is he has room for growth. “It’s just Game 1, I put in a lot of work. I expected to have a big game, I guess this is big to the world because it’s my first one, I plan on having a lot more,’’ Williams said. “I don’t plan on this being the best game of my career. This is just the start of me being me.’’ Count on it.

THREE: Goff was a steady Eddy, keeping the ship upright even after the Rams scored 17 unanswered points and took the 20-17 lead in the fourth quarter. Goff completed 18 of 28 passes for 217 yards with one touchdown and one interception.

“The theme of tonight, we kept shooting ourselves in the foot a little bit, certainly offensively. … It wasn’t our smoothest but a win is a win. We have to happy with that,’’ Goff said.

He couldn’t get Amon-Ra St. Brown much involved (3 catches, 13 yards), same with Sam LaPorta (4 catches, 45 yards). Goff didn’t really have an answer; it was just how the game flowed.

FOUR: Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford was on top of his game. He was a handful for the Lions defense, especially the young secondary. He was sacked twice and pressured often but still threw for 317 yards including one touchdown and one interception. Campbell couldn’t say enough about the former Lions’ QB. 

“That quarterback, Stafford, I thought played lights out, played tough, hit after hit; he just kept getting up and making unbelievable throws,’’ Campbell said. “I give them a lot of credit they fought, but we’re hard to break.’’

The coach even went a step farther. “Stafford, it’s almost like you don’t want to hit him because when you hit him he plays better. He just continued to make plays,’’ Campbell said.

FIVE: Marcus Davenport lived up to expectations at defensive end in his first Lions game and, as always, Aidan Hutchinson (5 tackles, 1 sack, 4 quarterback hits) was solid with a key play when the Rams got called for holding on him.

It seemed like linebacker Alex Anzalone was everywhere. He finished with a team-high 13 tackles and three tackles for loss. “Since TFLs became officially recorded in 1994, only one Lions player has produced 10-plus tackles and 3-plus TFLs in a season-opening game and that was Anzalone on Sunday night. It marked only the eighth time an NFL  player has logged this stat-line in a Week 1 game since 1994. Pretty impressive.

UP NEXT: The Tampa Bay Bucs (1-0) at the Lions (1-0), 1 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 16.

Detroit Lions’ Terrion Arnold ready to get to work to prove he’s worth Brad Holmes’ move up to draft him

ALLEN PARK — It’s easy to see why cornerback Terrion Arnold is Dan Campbell’s kind of guy. The Detroit Lions’ first-round pick, a cornerback from Alabama, exudes confidence and commitment to winning.

Arnold met with the media at the Lions facility on Friday, after being selected on Thursday night with the 24th overall pick. He brought alone eight members of his family.

While he just turned 21 in March, Arnold seems mature beyond that. 

“I envision myself as coming in here humble and just open to learn. I don’t think I know everything. I don’t want to come in here and be that rookie who thinks he’s going to start, I know I’m going to have to work for everything,’’ Arnold said. “I want to learn from the best. Even in the locker room I was in there with some of the veterans they said they were grateful to have me here, they welcomed me with open arms. … I don’t want to come off as arrogant. I want to come off as confident but not arrogant, I want to show them I’m eager to learn, to develop.’’

Lions GM Brad Holmes moved up five spots to draft him.

“They traded up to select me, I’ll always be grateful for that and I won’t take it for granted. I’m already coming in here with a chip on my shoulder, it’s just going to be that much of a chip on my shoulder,’’ Arnold said. “I saw St. Brown today and I just asked him when can we get on the Jugg machine. I feel like I’m a workaholic, nothing is going to be given to me.’’

Arnold paid some attention to the Lions last year because he was teammates at Alabama with nickel Brian Branch (second-round 2023), running back Jahmyr Gibbs (first-round 2023)  and wide receiver Jameson Williams (first-round 2022).

“It shows that Coach (Aaron) Glenn, he allows players to go out there and play. In my meeting with him earlier he was like he’s going to develop me into being a better player,’’ Arnold said. “At the end of the day we’re young players, my ceiling is very high and just to show up every day with a willingness to work , putting in overtime, you’ll get success in this game they saw football reveals character.’’’

It’s not really a coincidence that Lions GM Brad Holmes has draft Alabama players in the first round of three straight drafts. Coach Nick Saban prepares his players for life beyond college.

“Just being around (Saban) I learned something new every day,’’ Arnold said. “Whether that was you’ve got to be able to take hard coaching, be able to take constructive criticism or you have to apply the right technique or it’s hot outside and you don’t really want to do it but you have to go out there and do it to the way he wants to execute it. I really learned how to become a professional before becoming a professional around coach Saban.’’

(Rounds 2-3 start at 7 p.m. on Friday. The draft wraps on Saturday with rounds 4-7 starting at noon.)

Detroit Lions fall apart in second half, lose to 49ers in NFC Championship game

‘It’s like getting your heart ripped out’

A trip to the Super Bowl was there for the taking. The Lions jumped out aggressively on offense and defense in the first half at San Francisco on Sunday and took a 17-point lead into halftime.

All was good.

Then in the second half, everything fell apart.

“It’s like getting your heart ripped out, that’s hard,’’ an emotional coach Dan Campbell said afterward.

The San Francisco 49ers came back after a 24-7 halftime deficit and earned a trip to the Super Bowl with a 34-31 win. They will face the Kansas City Chiefs who beat the Baltimore Ravens in the earlier game.

Campbell said at halftime they weren’t doing backflips. They knew the 49ers would make a second-half run.

“We knew we were going to have to weather a storm in the second half.  so when they started to make a push we weren’t surprised,’’ Campbell said. “We just couldn’t counter back and we’ve always been able to counterback we just couldn’t do it in this one.’’

One eight-minute stretch in the third quarter was the killer. 

On a fourth-and-2 at the Niners’ 28, the Lions’ Jared Goff could not connect with Josh Reynolds so they turned the ball over on downs.

In the 49ers’ ensuing possession, Brock Purdy completed a 51-yard pass to Brandon Aiuyuk after it bounced off the helmet of Lions’ Kindle Vildor and into the hands of Aiyuk. San Francisco scored three plays later on the 6-yard touchdown pass to Aiyuk to close the gap, with Detroit then up 24-17.

Then when the Lions got the ball back Jahmyr Gibbs fumbled on first down and the Niners recovered at Detroit’s 24.Christian McCaffrey scored a touchdown four plays later to tie the game at 24-24.

Nothing worked for the Lions, allowing the Niners to score another touchdown and kick a field goal before Jameson Williams caught a touchdown pass with less than a minute left.

“We’ve been there before, so fourth quarter you feel like you’re going to get it back, we just couldn’t quite get over the hump,’’ Campbell said. “That hasn’t been us all year and it showed up today at the worst time.’’

Two key plays in the game were fourth downs that the Lions didn’t convert in the second half. On both they were in field goal range but Campbell chose to try for the first down instead,

“I just felt really good about us converting and getting our momentum and not letting them play long ball,’’ Campbell said. “They were bleeding the clock out and I wanted to get the upper hand back. It’s easy, hindsight, I get it, but I don’t regret those decisions. It’s hard, it didn’t come through. I understand the scrutiny I’ll get, that’s part of the gig, it just didn’t work out.’’

This was exactly how Campbell has coached all season and most of the time his gambles worked. It wasn’t a surprise he went for it on both. 

In the first half the Lions rushed for 148 yards. In fact Gibbs (42 yards), David Montgomery (60) and Jameson Williams (42) each had more rushing yards than Christian McCaffrey (29). But in the second half the Lions only managed 34 rushing yards and could not stop the 49ers – McCaffrey finished with 90 rushing and 42 receiving yards. 

Campbell couldn’t exactly put his finger on the difference. It’s a young team without much playoff experience, but he didn’t really use that as an excuse.

“One of the things we always tell everybody who’s never been here, particularly the young players, you don’t know which play is going to make the difference … You can only say so much you’ve got to live it, unfortunately you’ve got to get your heart ripped out which we did,’’ Campbell said.

“It’s a lesson learned. I told those guys this might be our only shot.. Do I think that? No. Do I believe that? No. However, I know how hard it is to get here,’’ the coach said. “I’m well aware it’s going to be twice as hard to get back to this point next year. … It’s going to be tough, you’re not hiding from anybody anymore everybody wants a piece of you which is fine. … We had an opportunity and we just didn’t close it out. It stings.’’

The Lions accomplished much this season. They won the NFC North with a 12-5 record and then won the franchise’s first playoff game in 32 years in the wildcard round over the Rams. They followed it up with a divisional win over the Bucs.