The Detroit Lions were able to gain victory over the Los Angeles Rams in the opening game of the 2024 season, despite the fact that they did not play their greatest style of football.
Following his team’s victory by a score of 26-20, Dan Campbell made the observation that, in general, the teams that make the fewest number of errors in early season games are the ones that end up winning.
Simply put, I give them a great deal of credit. They already fought, but they did it. Due to the fact that we are difficult to break, we did what we needed to do. And there was where our defense stood. Before that happens, Fox makes a fantastic punt, and the defense holds on to it. Offensively, we are able to get it back, and we are able to do it in overtime. We win the toss, and we don’t look back,” remarked Campbell. “So, we gradually got a groove. We did what we had to do, and I mentioned early in the week, ‘The team who makes the most mistakes is the one who normally loses these early games.’ And there was one less error that we committed. So now we simply got to develop from there.”During Campbell’s tenure, key starters have not played a considerable amount of snaps in the preseason, likely to avoid injury and to get a close look at guys battling for roster places.
David Montgomery dominates overtime, while Jameson Williams has a career night. Both of these players are studs.
“That is something that will always be there, and there will always be some other thing. I’m telling you, I just pulled up the first two games, the Thursday Game, Baltimore-KC, and then Green Bay-Philly, and you just go through and you just try to zip through it and look at stuff that are, ‘What sort of games are these? Are they what you believe they are?’ And some of these mistakes come up,” Campbell explained. “Does it cost the other team? How many? It’s inevitable, it’s every year, and it truly is.”
Campbell highlighted teams that execute “basic” football early in the season have a noticeable advantage.
“It’s first game and the ones that can just play basic football the best, the blocking, the tackling, targeting, communication, taking care of the football, being smart with it, the check down, they win,” Campbell said. “So, sure, there’s stuff that, man, they’re going to come along with it, and that’s the first time a lot of these guys in a while have played that many plays with that much intensity.
“So this is our first taste. We’ll get better. We’ll get in a better groove on both sides of the ball, we will,” Campbell concluded. “But, at the end of the day, our defense held these guys to less points than our offense, and our offense scored more points than their offense did. And so we found a way to win.”
