Week 13 Review: Vikes Capitalize on Crazy Momentum Swing
12/1/2008, updated 3:19 a.m.
Phil Mackey, KFAN.com

Postgame Audio: Jared Allen
Postgame Audio: Bernard Berrian
Postgame Audio: Darren Sharper
Postgame Audio: Gus Frerotte

What an enormous victory for the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday night. Absolutely huge.

Not only did the Purple take over sole possession of first place in the NFC North, but they did it by completely dismantling the same Chicago Bears team that put up 48 points in a week 7 meeting at Soldier Field. The offensive attack was balanced, the defensive line swarmed, defensive backs and linebackers picked off passes, and the special teams units avoided meltdowns.

Ultimately, the Vikings were destined to win this game as long as they played mistake-free football, but things didn’t look so optimistic late in the third quarter, when the Bears appeared to see a drive fizzle near midfield.

With just under 7:00 left in the first half, the Bears found themselves facing 3rd-and-4 from the Minnesota 40-yardline while nursing an early 7-3 lead. RB Matt Forte took a handoff from Kyle Orton but was stuck by Kevin Williams for a 2-yard loss, and it looked like the Vikings were about to regain possession, but CB Benny Sapp was flagged for unnecessary roughness after inexplicably scuffling with a Chicago defender.

A stupid penalty at an extremely inopportune time. Instead of stuffing the Bears beyond the outskirts of field goal range, the Vikings defense was forced to trot back on the field, with Chicago now 15 yards closer to the end zone.

Forte took advantage of the new life on the very next play and broke a 27-yard run down to the 1-yardline. Just like that, the Bears were primed to punch in from the doorsteps of the end zone to take a 14-3 lead.

It was at this point in the game that Chicago’s gears of momentum came to a grinding halt.

After a failed pass attempt to TE Greg Olsen, Orton turned around and handed off to Forte on 2nd-and-goal from the 1-yardline. Forte was stuffed.

The Bears thought, ‘OK, that’s fine. We’ll just give it to the fullback. He’ll punch it in.’ So they handed off to FB Jason Davis. But he was stuffed too, by Fred Evans. 4th down.

A field goal in this spot would have put the Bears up 10-3, but they wanted to stick a dagger into the Vikings’ hearts by scoring a touchdown, so head coach Lovie Smith told the punt team to take a seat. The Bears lined up in their goal line set once again, and just as they had done on the previous two plays, they tried to punch in with a handoff up the middle -- to no avail.

Jared Allen swallowed Forte up from behind, capping off an incredible goal line stand that blew the roof off the Metrodome.

“Our defensive line on that goal line stand was unbelievable,” said Darren Sharper. “For them to slow down a team that has a good offensive line and a god running back, you don’t see that happen too many times in the NFL. When you’re on the one-inch line and you don’t get in, I think that took a little bit of wind out of their sails and it changed the momentum of the game.”

The momentum, however, was not done shifting.

With the Vikings now backed up inside their own 1-yardline, it seemed logical to run a quarterback sneak, or some sort of halfback dive to avoid taking a safety. Instead, Gus Frerotte -- a master surgeon -- dropped back, scanned the field, and lobbed a bomb down the left side of the field. The sea parted and Bernard Berrian emerged, wide open, gently cradling this perfect pass. He looked over his right shoulder at a charred Charles Tillman, who was torched beyond reality, and sprinted to the end zone for a 99-yard touchdown.

Talk about a momentum swing. Within 2 minutes, the Bears were stuffed on the goal line and the Vikings hit a 99-yard home run the other way.

“That is the first time I’ve seen 99 yards in a game and I have been playing football since I was eight,” said Jared Allen. “That right there is just a dagger in your chest. Defensively, if that happened to us, I would say, ‘Holy smokes,’ so kudos to [the offense].”

The Bears had a chance to take a 14-3 lead, but in a flash they found themselves trailing 10-7 -- a 14-point swing. Who knows if the Vikings would have been able to claw back from an 11-point deficit. The outcome of the game likely would have been completely different.

“It’s a hell of a job by our defense and great play call by [offensive coordinator] Darrell Bevell, and Bernard and Gus made it happen,” said Brad Childress. “It all starts up front with that defensive line and then that offensive line protecting it so he has time to shape a throw out there to Bernard Berrian. I’m happy for Bernard to be able to go 99. It’s about as far as you can go.”

On that particular play, the Vikings lined up with four receivers and three of them ran go routes.  Tillman came off of Berrian to pick up TE Visanthe Shiancoe, who was running up the seam. Needless to say, Tillman did not have safety help over the top, and he was left in a cloud of dust.

“It was a lucky play,” Berrian said. “It’s the luckiest play I’ve ever had. [Tillman] bit and went to make the play on Shiancoe. Gus said he looked to one side then came back to the other side. He said he was surprised how open I actually was.”

Frerotte was indeed surprised.

“At that point you’re just saying to yourself, ‘Why is he so wide open? What’s going on? Is there a safety coming over? What’s the deal here?’” Frerotte said. “You throw it, you try to put air on it, because I’m thinking Tillman’s just going to run with him. I’m trying to put it downfield and let Bernard run past him, and all of the sudden [Tillman] fades to the inside and Bernard’s just running wide open. At that point you’re saying, ‘Please be in the right spot.’”

The 99-yard touchdown ties the NFL record for longest offensive play. The feat has been accomplished 10 other times through the air and only once on the ground -- Tony Dorsett at the Metrodome in 1983.

More importantly, however, the touchdown capped a sequence of events that drastically shifted the game’s momentum in favor of the Vikings. The Bears were unable to overcome such an enormous wave, and they eventually succumbed by 20 points.

Vikes Control Their Own Destiny

It’s taken three full months, but following a victory over the Bears and a Packers loss at home to Carolina, the Vikings now sit alone at the top of the NFC North, controlling their own destiny for the foreseeable future.

“It is big,” said Darren Sharper. “That is what coach Childress and them came here for, for us to be in a position like this. All of the free agent acquisitions that we had, the veteran team we have returning, were for games like this, to be in first place in December. Like coach said after the game, it doesn’t mean anything unless we go in next week and beat Detroit. We have to keep the mentality that we’re still playing for first place.”

This marks the first time the Vikings have held the division lead late in the season under Childress, but as Sharper said, the team understands that four games remain on the schedule, including a potential trap game against a winless Lions squad next Sunday.

“We have a quarter of the season left,” Frerotte said. “We have a lot of games left, a lot of plays to be made. We have to keep looking at this and learning from this. We are really growing together as a team. I think the guys understand that as long as we keep fighting we go ta chance no matter what happens.”

After Detroit, the Vikings must play at Arizona before coming home for games against Atlanta and the New York Giants.

The Bears play three consecutive home games -- Jacksonville, New Orleans, Green Bay -- before traveling to Houston to finish the season.

Green Bay is home against Houston, at Jacksonville, at Chicago and home against Detroit, although the Packers would need a miracle to make up two games and leapfrog two teams with only one month to play.

Defense Dominates, Sharper Finally Gets One

Darren Sharper has fielded questions all season about his lack of an interception, but those questions will finally go away. Sharper snagged his first interception of the season on Sunday night -- the 54th of his career, which leads all active players.

“[Orton] was trying to pump me,” Sharper said about the interception, which happened with about 7:00 left in the third quarter. “What they’ve been doing a lot of times is try to pump me to the middle so I’d move and they could hit a sideline shot. I just didn’t get off my land mark and just stayed where I was supposed to be. Coach always preaches that sometimes the ball will just hit you in the face if you stay where you’re supposed to be. He’s been trying to grind that philosophy into my head, hoping that I’d start believing. It worked on that play.”

The interception set up a 22-yard touchdown run by Chester Taylor that put the Vikings in front, 24-14. The Vikings would go on to score 17 points off three Orton interceptions. Benny Sapp and Ben Leber reeled in the other two.

The interceptions certainly stand out, but the Vikings defensive line did the majority of the dirty work, forcing Orton to run for his life on numerous occasions. Jared Allen finished with three sacks on the night, and he was the only Viking to record a sack, but Kevin Williams, Brian Robison, Ray Edwards, and other various linebackers and defensive backs found themselves face-to-face with Orton throughout the night.

Orton finished 11-for-29 with 153 yards, two touchdowns and three interceptions. The entire offense gained only 228 total yards.

Notes and Stuff…

- Adrian Peterson continued his thorough domination of the Chicago Bears, rushing 28 times for 131 yards and a touchdown.

“We wanted to come in and establish the running game, and we did that,” Peterson said.

“It was very physical down there and I was expecting that coming into this game. We were playing against the Bears. They have a great defense, so we had to go out there with the determination that we had to fight for every yard that we could.”

As crazy as it sounds, 131 yards and one touchdown is the worst performance Peterson has ever had against the Bears. Props to the Chicago defense for holding him in check…

- Early in the second quarter, with the Vikings inside the 10-yardline, Gus Frerotte threw an incomplete third-down pass to Bobby Wade in the corner of the end zone, and he was promptly lit up by DE Adewale Ogunleye well after the ball was released.

Frerotte wound up face down on the ground, his lifeless body not moving at all. The refs obviously did not see the blatant late hit because they didn’t throw a flag.

“It was really late,” Frerotte said. “I was waiting to see what happened with the ball to Bobby [Wade], and then the next things I know I’m just lying on the ground. It threw me for a little bit of a loop because you’re not expecting it in that situation.

“Sometimes those cheap shots tick you off pretty good and you want to play well and show them that no matter what you do to me or my team we’re going to play through it.”

The replay was shown at least three times on the Jumbotron, and Brad Childress was visibly irate at the officiating crew.

“We saw things a different way,” Childress said.

“There’s a lot of those that may get fined on Monday but don’t get flagged on Sunday, so we’ll see.”

Childress said the officials do not pay attention to replays on the Jumbotron, but it’s hard to fathom how they missed this one live, let alone on the big screen.

- Artis Hicks (elbow) was inactive, and Ryan Cook once again started at right tackle.

“Without seeing the films, I thought he took a very good approach to practice this week,” Childress said about Cook. “We talked about when he was replaced that we didn’t know if it was going to be just a play, a series, a game, two or three games. It just so happens it was just a week.”

- Aundrae Allison and Maurice Hicks -- the primary punt and kick returners throughout most of the season -- were both deactivated. Berrian returned punts and Darius Reynaud returned kicks. Berrian actually lost three yards on two returns, while Reynaud gained 62 yards on two kick returns, including a 49-yarder out past midfield.

- The 99-yard touchdown by Bernard Berrian made Wikipedia within three minutes. Crazy.

- At halftime, John Randle was the 17th player inducted into the Vikings Ring of Honor.

You can contact Phil by emailing PMac@kfan.com, or you can visit his website, PhilMackey.com.