The one thing about the NFL that can be guaranteed is that there are no guarantees.
Nothing should ever be taken for granted by teams or players, particularly if they want to go far in the playoffs. All it takes for it to end is one significant injury, defeat, coaching change, or other incident.
In the NFC Championship Game on Sunday, the Detroit Lions were defeated 34-31 by the San Francisco 49ers, making them the most recent victims of it.
After leading 24-7 at the half, Detroit faltered as San Francisco scored 27 straight points to win the game and advance to Super Bowl LVIII, a venue the Lions have never visited.
Following the game, media were granted access to hear Lions head coach Dan Campbell’s frank but harsh evaluation of the team’s prospects in his chat with the players:
“Look, I told those guys, ‘This may have been our only shot,'” stated Campbell. “Do I think that’s true? No…But I know how hard it is to get to this place. I’m positive about this. It will be twice as difficult to get to this point next year as it was this one.”
It is possible for two things to be true. Campbell is right when he says that some teams reach their pinnacle and then fade. It’s also possible that telling his team out loud wasn’t the best course of action.
However, given that their strong rookie class was a major factor in their initial success, the Lions might very well return the following season.
Sam LaPorta, Brian Branch, Jack Campbell, and Jahmyr Gibbs all contributed on both ends of the field, enabling the Lions to win the NFC North for the first time and advance to the conference championship game for the first time since January 12, 1992.
Before dispatching the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Los Angeles Rams at home during the postseason, the Lions finished the season 12-5. They simply were unable to hang on for another half against a 49ers squad that had won all of the NFC bracket’s games throughout the regular and postseason.
The way Jared Goff performs under a new offensive coordinator in the event that Ben Johnson departs is one factor that might sink Detroit. In the NFC North, Jordan Love and the Green Bay Packers are gaining ground, while the QB situations of the Chicago Bears and Minnesota Vikings continue to make them relative unknowns.
For the time being, though, Campbell & Co. will need to analyze what went wrong and figure out how to raise the margins for 2024.
