jameis Winston – Lions Lowdown

In big moments, the Lions stepped up in the 34-27 OT win over the Giants

Five reasons Detroit was able to fight back and win

DETROIT — Jahmyr Gibbs’ 69-yard touchdown run on the Lions’ first snap of overtime gave Detroit its first lead of the game. Aidan Hutchinson’s sack of Giants quarterback Jameis Winston on fourth-and-5 in the next series, sealed the 34-27 win for Detroit.

It was the first lead of Sunday’s game for the Lions.

“They played hard — they threw the kitchen sink at us, we knew they would, that’s what the tape said,’’ coach Dan Campbell said of the 2-10 Giants who have not won a road game this season.

“I’m proud of the guys. We hung in there, we fought, we felt our next series would be the one we were going to get the upper hand and we did,’’ Campbell said. “It’s not easy to hang in a game like that where there are things that aren’t going perfect. But at the end of the day when we needed it most, guys showed up. It wasn’t perfect, there are things to clean up, certainly it came down to the wire, we had to win in overtime, I’ll take that win, it’s a good win.’’

It’s a short week with the Packers coming to Ford Field on Thanksgiving.

Gibbs’ overtime touchdown was one of three he had — two rushing, one receiving. Overall the running back amassed 264 yards (219 rushing).

“Gibbs, he’s electric. When he found a crease he was going to the house. This was not about first downs or picking up a few yards. This guy was going to the house, he’s got the juice to make it happen,’’ Campbell said. “He’s a difference maker. He bailed us out today in a big way.’’

It was another bounce-back win for the Lions who haven’t lost two straight since October 2022. They’re now 7-4 and still in the thick of a division race.

Campbell said he never knows what this type of win can do.

“Sometimes it’s just important to remind yourself what we’re all capable of, even when the chips are down, and things get hard, you don’t ever forget how to dig in one more time, find how to lean on each other and do your job,’’ Campbell said. “Anytime you can get a win like this, that’s a good thing. That very easily a number of times could have gone the other way and we all know it, but it didn’t. We made the plays we needed to make.’’

Five of the reasons the Lions won:

ONE: Again, Jahmyr Gibbs. He averaged 14.6 yards per carry and scored three touchdowns. Electric is the perfect adjective. “That dude is as huge as they come in the league, he’s making his claim across the league as one of the best players regardless of position,’’ quarterback Jared Goff said. “We’re lucky to have him, he’s so electric and to do that, to supplement some of the struggles we were having is awesome.’’

TWO: The offensive line also came up big – they were a key reason Gibbs was able to find creases and break free. Four of them are struggling with injuries, but it didn’t seem to affect them. “Those guys are a rare breed. They’re battling right now through some stuff. They don’t want your sympathy; they’re just going to put their head down and work,’’ Goff said. “I’m proud of those guys, thankful for them laying it on the line for me and the backs every week.’’

THREE: Hutchinson’s sack to win in overtime was huge and it was the first sack of Jameis Winston in the game. Hutchinson also had six quarterback hits and six tackles. The Giants finished with 517 yards of offense, so it’s not like the Lions shut them down, they just came up big when it mattered. Late in the fourth quarter the Giants were stopped on fourth-and-6 at Detroit’s 6-yard line. On the next drive the Lions’ Jake Bates kicked a 59-yard field goal to tie the game and send it to OT. “That’s what gave us a chance. … That changed the whole game with that stop,’’ Campbell said. “Defense once again stepped up for us.’’

FOUR: Jared Goff said there are plays he’d like back but there were some huge moments for the quarterback. After the Red Zone stop in the fourth quarter, Goff got the ball at Detroit’s 6-yard line with just 2:54 on the clock and down 27-24. Goff ran the 2-minute offense effectively so Bates could tie the game. The quarterback finished 28 of 42 for 279 yards, two touchdowns, one interception and he was sacked three times. Campbell credited him with coming up big when they needed it.

FIVE: Special teams also came up big. Bates’ 59-yard field goal to send the game to overtime was the standout. “That was a big kick, that was big time,’’ Campbell said. “He’s clutch when we need him most. He goes out there and makes the kick for us. That’s not an easy kick.’’ Punter Jack Fox pinned the Giants inside their 18-yard line 7 times and of that four were inside the 10. On the opening kickoff, linebacker Malcolm Rodriguez, playing in his first game in nearly a year, tackled the returner.

UP NEXT: Green Bay Packers (7-3-1) face the Lions (7-4) at 1 p.m. on Thanksgiving at Ford Field. The Packers beat the Vikings, 23-6, on Sunday.

Five things to watch as Lions face the Giants; plus injury update, prediction

While the Giants have lost five straight, Lions coach Dan Campbell will not overlook them when they play at Ford Field on Sunday.

Again, the Lions (6-4) are coming off a loss and again they look to bounce back. They haven’t lost back-to-back games since October 2022 and they intend to keep that streak alive. Campbell said the urgency is always there.

“We’ve had urgency. We’re an urgent team. Things haven’t gone our way that we would like. I mean we would love to be sitting here undefeated right now and that’s not the reality, we’re not undefeated,’’ Campbell said. “But there’s an urgency that’s there. And I know this, if you say, ‘Well let’s ramp up more urgency,’ that’s when you start making mistakes, that’s when you start panicking, that’s when guys start doing things they shouldn’t do. They’re trying to make plays and then they cost us all. That’s where bad stuff really happens because that means you don’t really believe in what you’re doing. You’re grasping for straws.

“I know what we’re doing, I know what we need to do. We go back to work, we clean up the little things, we adjust, we adapt, we move on and let’s find a way to get a W,’’ Campbell added.

Five things to watch:

ONE: The Lions defense played its best game of the season at Philadelphia. Coordinator Kelvin Sheppard saw a never-blink mentality and said they never wavered at any point in the game. Still, he would like to see more takeaways. “The way that game was structured on that night our offense needed one more possession, that was the nature of that game,’’ Sheppard said. “That was the one thing if I could, kind of a little teeny thing that we would have improved upon it would’ve been to steal a possession for our offense.’’

TWO: Can the Lions offense rebound? Jaredd Goff said he isn’t worried about the offensive inconsistency, he’s concerned about winning games. “I don’t care if we have 100 yards. If we win the game, that’s all that matters. The output of the offense, of course, yeah you’d love to score 40 every week and 500 yards like we did 10 days ago or two weeks ago, whenever that was,’’ Goff said. “But yeah no, you have a bad game, you learn from it. The output is not nearly as important as just finding a way to get a W, and we didn’t do that last week.”

THREE: If the offense is to bounce back after their worst showing of the season in loss at Eagles Goff and WR Amon-Ra St. Brown will have to connect like they have been until the Eagles debacle. “We’re good. Again, I consider that an outlier for what we’ve done in our career together,’’ Goff said. “You learn from it, you look at it, we talk about different ways we can get better. Yeah, no grand conversation about it, no.” Goff targeted St. Brown a dozen times but only connected on two at Philadelphia.

FOUR: Rookie Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart is out because he hasn’t passed concussion protocol which means veteran Jameis Winston will start. Campbell said they have been preparing for both, but thought they would face Winston. “I think the run game itself stays intact, I think the pass game – there is some vertical pass game to it. I don’t think it changes a ton,’’’ Campbell said. “And look, I know Winston very well, man. This guy, he can put it on a dime. He’s not afraid to freaking rip it in there, he’s a competitive, smart guy. And so look, he’s going to give him a chance. He’s played a lot of games, man, won a lot of games.’’ Campbell knows Winston well since both were with the New Orleans Saints in 2020.

“Well, I think there are a lot of things that – I think the core of what they do, and the pro-style offense itself is not going to change. And I think even if Dart had played, there wasn’t going to be a ton of quarterback run, things of that nature. So, I think the run game itself stays intact, I think the pass game – there is some vertical pass game to it. I don’t think it changes a ton. And look, I know Winston very well, man. This guy, he can put it on a dime. He’s not afraid to freaking rip it in there, he’s competitive, smart guy. And so look, he’s going to give him a chance. He’s played a lot of games, man, won a lot of games. But we’ve been prepared for both, we’ve made sure that we prepared just in case if you got a little different flavor with Dart. But we kind of felt like Winston was probably going to be the guy.”

FIVE: The offensive line needs to step up. Goff was twice but pressured all game long. He had a difficult time connecting with pass-catchers because he had no time. The run game averages 30 rushing yards per game but was held to 74 in part – not totally – due to the offensive line getting beat in the trenches.

LIONS INJURIES: OUT — CB Terrion Arnold, S Kerby Joseph, EDGE Marcus Davenport, OL Miles Frazier, EDGE Josh Paschal; TE Sam LaPorta likely out for rest of the season. QUESTIONABLE — LT Taylor Decker, CB Khalil Dorsey, C Graham Glasgow, G Tate Ratledge, CB D.J. Reed, RT Penei Sewell, WR Isaac TeSlaa and RB Sione Vaki.

GIANTS INJURIES: OUT — QB Jaxson Dart, DB Paulson Adebo, TE Thomas Fidone, LB Kayvon Thibodeaux; QUESTIONABLE — DB Tae Banks, RB Eric Gray, DB Tyler Nubin.

PREDICTION: Lions 38, Giants 17

Five reasons the Lions lost to the Bucs; extend losing streak to 7 games

DETROIT — Matt Patricia’s survival as coach of the Detroit Lions may be in more peril after Sunday. The Lions’ defense made quarterback Jameis Winston look like a Hall of Famer in waiting, in Tampa Bay’s 38-17 win at Ford Field.

It was the seventh straight loss for the Lions who drop to 3-10-1.

“I think the one thing that’s consistent, the team fights, they work hard, really regardless of who’s out there,’’ coach Matt Patricia said.

Is that enough? Apparently not, but wide receiver Danny Amendola agrees with Patricia.

“We got a lot of guys who are beat up, banged up and injured and we got guys rolling in, next man up, trying to step up, trying to make plays. Everyone here is trying their best, everybody is fighting,’’ Amendola said. “I love how everyone comes to work, I love how we fight on game day and whatever the situation may be, we are going to get out there and fight for our brothers. So that is what I love about this team.”

He said they have to find an edge.

“We have to believe, we have to roll into each game thinking we are going to win,’’ Amendola said.

They have two games left this season to figure it out.

Five reasons the Lions lost:

1. Winston had a monstrous day thanks to Detroit’s defense which was beat again and again and again on deep crossing patterns. Winston was 28 of 42 for 458 yards, four touchdowns and one interception. Darius Slay dropped what could’ve been an interception. Detroit’s secondary just plain got beat time after time. On Breshad Perriman’s first touchdown (for 34 yards) cornerback Rashaan Melvin was about 5 yards behind the play. Trey Flowers muffed on a sack. Overall the Lions’ defense didn’t look prepared. One highlight was Jahlani Tavai’s first interception, but the Lions offense could not score afterward.

2. The Lions fought back in the second half. Down by just a touchdown (24-17) with five minutes left, Detroit’s offense had the ball but quarterback David Blough’s pass intended for Danny Amendola was intercepted by Sean Murphy-Binding and returned 70 yards for a touchdown. “Can’t do it. Obviously it’s the play that will come back, we’ll look at as ultimately the dagger in the game. Danny ran a good route I left it a little behind him, the guy made a good play and went the other way with it,’’ Blough said. “You can’t do it playing quarterback in this league you have to value the football first and foremost. It’s frustrating it happened there after the guys fought so hard to battle back. I’ll take it it’s on me, it’s frustrating.’’ Blough was 24 of 43 for 260 yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions.

3. The bad start was a killer. The Lions were down by three touchdowns with 8:13 left in the second quarter. “The slow start was not really what we want to do against an explosive team like this,’’ Patricia said. “Obviously, detrimental. They can score extremely fast, they’re a very aggressive defense, they have good players on both sides of the ball you have to do a better job to start the game.’’ The defense gave up three first-half touchdowns and the offense was stuck in neutral. At the end of the first quarter the Lions’ offense had 1 net yard (the Bucs had 236). At halftime it was up to 56 yards.

4. The fourth quarter was a disaster again. This season the Lions have been outscored 122-84 in the final stanza — it’s on the offense for not getting it done and the defense for letting the opponent march down the field. Again on Sunday they were outscored 14-7 in the fourth. Patricia said it is not a result of conditioning. “I don’t think you ever want to put frustration into words because it never comes out right, so I would say for us we understand, we just look at it from the standpoint of why, what are we doing and how do we improve it,’’ Patricia said. He did not offer any more specifics.

5. Injuries have really hit the Lions hard, especially in the last few weeks. Within the last seven days they’ve put four players on injured reserve (Da’Shawn Hand, Marv Jones Jr., Jarrad Davis and Joe Dahl). Wes Hills, the starting running back on Sunday (replacing the injured Bo Scarbrough), was playing in his first NFL game. He had a slow start, but finished with two rushing touchdowns becoming just the third Lions player to rush for two touchdowns in his first career game, along with Jahvid Best (2010) and Billy Sims (1980). Ten Lions who started in Week One were not available on Sunday (that includes Quandre Diggs who was traded). The others were injured or on injured reserve. That’s a ton.

BONUS: Bucs wide receiver Breshad Perriman finished with three receiving touchdowns — he had two in the first 11 games. He’s just another opponent that the Lions’ defense made look like a Pro Bowl player. He had five catches for 113 yards. Curiously enough, Breshad’s dad, Brett, played for the Lions for six years (1991-96) and never had a three-touchdown game.

NEXT UP: The Lions play at Denver at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 22. The Broncos (5-9) lost 23-3 to the Chiefs on Sunday.