A lot was made of the Detroit Lions playing their first outdoor game of the season on Sunday, and it is notably to play a first outdoor game in a season. Raw, raining conditions at Lambeau Field added to the idea the Lions might not function all that well.
As expected, the Lions ran the ball plenty against the Green Bay Packers-32 times for 124 yards counting Jared Goff's kneel-downs and with an odd play call that led to Kalif Raymond losing 12 yards on a run. "Sonic and Knuckles", David Montgomery and Jahmyr Gibbs, combined for 139 yards on 28 yards with a touchdown from Gibbs. The Lions' backfield duo also combined for four receptions.
Speaking of Goff, he completed his first 11 passes of the game on his way to going 18-for-22 for 145 yards with a touchdown to Amon-Ra St. Brown. Turns out Goff is not merely an "indoor cat", even if a recommendation to sit him in fantasy football this week was spot-on. Goff continued his run of efficiency in adverse conditions on Sunday, which is exactly what he had to do if the Lions were going to win.
Lions play clean game in bad conditions, take control of NFC North
When it came down to it, the Lions played like the team who doesn't play its home games indoors. The Lions had zero turnovers and five penalties for 51 yards. Two of those penalties (for 30 yards) were on Brian Branch, for his helmet-to-helmet hit that led to an ejection and an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty after he was ejected. Other than that, there were just three penalties for 21 yards on the Lions during Sunday's game
By comparison, the Packers were called for 10 penalties totaling 67 yards. As noted by Jeff Risdon of Lions Wire, six of those penalties were pre-snap. Quarterback Jordan Love came into the game with a groin injury, but an awful decision gift-wrapped a momentum-grabbing pick-six for Lions' safety Kerby Joseph right before halftime.
The Packers also had a lot of dropped passes on Sunday (six by Risdon's count). Wet conditions automatically make it tough to catch and generally handle the football, but the Lions had no such issues.
Packers kicker Brandon McManus also missed a 46-yard field goal, which isn't a chip shot in perfect conditions. But the miss did surrender field position to the Lions, who got a field goal on their next drive (a 27-yarder for Jake Bates).
After the game, Goff nailed the sentiment about his team.
The Packers could have taken the lead in the NFC North based on a head-to-head tiebreaker with a win on Sunday. But the Lions, just as they did in Week 7 against the Minnesota Vikings in the same circumstance, took care of business as they seized further control of the division.
