The Vikings Played The Worst Half Of The Season To Fall Behind 33-0 To The Colts

The Vikings hosted the Colts on Saturday afternoon with a chance to win the NFC North with a win. Facing an Indianapolis team that had lost three straight, most recently getting demolished by the Cowboys in a 54-19 loss, it seemed like a great opportunity for the 10-3 Vikings to make a statement and try to fight back against the fraud allegations chasing them as a 10-win team with a -2 point differential on the season.

Unfortunately for Minnesota, they would do the opposite, playing one of the worst halves of football any team has played all season in the NFL to fall behind 33-0 to a Colts team averaging 16.1 points per game entering Saturday.

The game started with the Colts marching down the field, but having to settle for a short field goal in the red zone to take a 3-0 lead. That defensive stand to only give up three points would prove to be the high point of the half, as Minnesota’s first offensive possession was a three-and-out that ended with a blocked punt that got returned for a touchdown.

Minnesota would manage to create their first (and only) big play of the first half on the next possession, with a 44-yard scamper by Dalvin Cook that would immediately be negated by a fumble by Cook on the very next play — their only play run in Indianapolis territory.

The Colts would cash that turnover in for a touchdown on another absolute march down the field, with Matt Ryan finding Deon Jackson to make it 17-0 in the first quarter.

Minnesota’s next drive would again see them failing to pick up a first down, facing 4th and inches where they were stuffed on an inside run play to Cook.

The Colts would kick a field goal off of that to make it 20-0, making the next drive an absolute must score situation for the Vikings. Instead, they again found themselves in a 4th down situation at their 30 and this time tried a fake punt pass that failed in rather hilarious fashion as the punter’s pass sailed high and incomplete.

Another Colts field goal followed, and the two teams would trade successful punts from there, as Minnesota finally got its first stop of the game. However, that would be the best sequence of the half for the Vikings, who had a hold on the punt return that backed them up to the five, and on third down, Kirk Cousins rifled a pass right to a Colts defender for a pick-six to make it 30-0.

Adding injury to insult, all-world receiver Justin Jefferson left the game after an incompletion the play before that interception after landing hard on a hit over the middle. On their next drive, Minnesota would have a big pass play overturned on replay and once again went three-and-out, punting it back to the Colts, who matriculated the ball down the field to, again, set up another short field goal.

It was, truly, as bad a half of football as anything we’ve seen all season — with, ironically, the Colts’ 4th quarter collapse against Dallas in their last game as one of the top contenders for that title. Minnesota finished the half with 83 total yards (half of which came on that one Cook run prior to the fumble), went 0-of-6 on third downs, allowed three sacks, punted three times (one blocked for a TD), had two turnovers on downs, threw a pick-six, and only forced one punt by the Colts all half.