Minnesota Vikings defeat Oakland, gain sole possession of NFC North

The Minnesota Vikings are all alone in first place in the NFC North. The Green Bay Packers lost to the Detroit Lions for the first time in Wisconsin since 1991 and the Viking took advantage of that with a 30-14 victory over the Oakland Raiders.

The Vikings got the ball first and the put a beautiful drive together to score a TD. The drive had a pair of runs with wide receivers Cordarrelle Patterson and Adam Theilen to mix things up. The score came on a 11-yard pass from Teddy Bridgewater to Rhett Ellison which also featured a wonderful effort from Ellison to push himself into the endzone.

A pair of Blair Walsh field goals would get the Vikings out to a 13-0 lead, but the Raiders were coming. The second quarter saw a pair of touchdown passes from Derek Carr to give the Raiders a 14-13 lead just under the two minute warning. The Viking immediately answered with Patterson returning the kickoff 93 yards for a touchdown to regain the lead and they’d never give it back.

The third quarter was a rough one offensively for both teams and quarterback Teddy Bridgewater certainly didn’t look great for the purple in the frame. It took until 3:51 left in the fourth for the first score of the second half via a Blair Walsh field goal to make it 23-14.

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Oakland was trying to make it exciting and were about to score, but Terrance Newman picked off Carr, Newman’s second pick of the game, in the end zone to thwart the scoring opportunity. The Vikings sealed the deal with an 80-yard run from Adrian Peterson to give the Vikings a 30-14 lead.

Peterson ran for 203 yards on 26 carries in the game and scored the one touchdown. Latavius Murry ran for 48 yards on 12 carries for Oakland.

Bridgewater was 14/22 for 140 yards and a TD. Carr went 29/43 for 302 yards and a pair of TD and a pair of picks.

Ellison had the only TD grab for the Vikings. Nine Minnesota players registered a catch in the game, with no one having more than two grabs. Diggs led in yardage with 46 yards on two catches. Amari Cooper had five catches for 79 yards and Michael Crabtree had four catches for 55 yards for Oakland.