And We're Back

The Saints fumble the opening kickoff, Culpepper hits Travis Taylor in the endzone on the first play from scrimmage, and the nightmarish start to the 2005 season is over. To say that Sunday's game was a breath of fresh air is an understatement, it is more like being released from a bear trap at the bottom of Lake Minnetonka. With no clear cut opposition to the North crown the Vikings appear to have a great shot at the playoffs afterall.

Everything seemed to click on Sunday, especially during the first half when Minnesota took a 24-6 lead going into the locker room. Daunte was Daunte again, going 21-29 passing with 300 yards, 3 touchdowns and no picks. Mewelde Moore had an excellent showing and made a great case to be the #1 guy in the Purple's backfield this season. The long TD pass to rookie Troy Williamson somehow reminded us Randy Moss and helped us forget at the same time. Even without star safety Darren Sharper the defense was superb and one can imagin what it will look like with him back in the secondary.

So I'll admit that after the 37-8 disaster in Cincinatti I wasn't so sure about this team, coming into the year I had high expectations and I said that they were a Super Bowl caliber squad. The Bengals game was quite possibly the worst performance I have ever seen by a proffessional sports team and the week 1 loss to Tampa was not much better. However now I have come to believe that those two games were just snags, flukes even. Sure the Bucs and Bengals played great but the Vikes just didn't show up to put up any kind of opposition. So here following an impressive 33-16 win over New Orleans I will once again predict the Minnesota Vikings to make their biggest postseason run since 1998.