Vikings Roll Over Seahawks for First Win of the Season

The Minnesota Vikings earned their first win on Sunday in the home opener against the Seattle Seahawks!

Minnesota:
QB:
K. Cousins 30/38 323 yds 3 TD 1 sack 128.4 rtg

RB:
A. Mattison 26 car 112 yds 4.3 avg 24 long (6 rec 59 yds 9.8 avg)
A. Abdullah 5 car 24 yds 4.8 avg 9 long

WR:
J. Jefferson 9 rec 118 yds 13.1 avg 1 TD 28 long
T. Conklin 7 rec 7 yds 10.0 avg 1 TD 17 long
A. Thielen 6 rec 50 yds 8.3 avg 1 TD 21 long
KJ Osborn 2 rec 26 yds 13.0 avg 15 long

DEF:
E. Kendricks 1 sack
E. Griffen 1 sack

K:
G. Joseph 3/3 FG (43, 34, 20) 3/3 XP

Game Summary:
The Vikings deferred to start the game. On the first drive, Seattle drove down and scored to take the first lead of the game. Minnesota responded with a drive of their own that ended in a Cousins to Conklin touchdown! This is Tyler Conklin's first TD of the season! The Seahawks then drove down on an 11 play drive to kick a field goal to take the lead once again.
Seattle then proceeded to score once more after a Vikings punt. However, the Vikings then drove down and scored on a Cousins-Thielen pass! This left the Seahawks with only a 3 point advantage. Seattle drove down again and looked like they would kick a field goal. However, Jason Myers missed for the first time in 37 kicks! The Vikings took over and drove down for a huge drive that ended in a Justin Jefferson touchdown, his second on the year! Seattle didn't have much left and ended the half.
Coming out of half the Vikings had the ball and drove down on a 16 play drive that ended in a field goal from Greg Joseph. It would turn out that the rest of the game, Seattle would not score again and the Vikings would kick 2 more field goals! 

I would say this Vikings team looked similar to previous weeks but certain aspects had obvious improvement from last week to secure this week's win. The offense was really good the past two weeks, and this week they were even better! Dalvin Cook was inactive today after spraining an ankle last weekend, so I didn't know what to expect from the Vikings on the ground. I was severely mistaken! Alexander Mattison more then filled in for Dalvin Cook on Sunday and I was thoroughly impressed! Now, he didn't score today which would have been cool but he did his part.
I would say the most surprising thing to go right today is that the defense turned it up to 11 in the second half! They allowed less then 100 yards of offense by the Seattle offense and held them to no score. If they can replicate this even 60% of the time the offense will have that much more cushion. It is becoming abundantly obvious that the Vikings weakness will be the secondary and the strength will be the offense. So it is so much more encouraging to see both sides of the ball have a good day.

Injury Report
RB Dalvin Cook was out of today's game with ankle sprains after not practicing all week.
LB Anthony Barr was inactive again for the third straight game this season and has not played in over a year.
WR Ihmir Smith-Marsette injured his toe in the second quarter and was briefly replaced by Ameer Abdullah. 
OT Christian Darrisaw was inactive yet again, still recovering from surgery. 
CB Harrison Hand was inactive today after dealing with an injury this past week.
DE James Lynch, QB Kellen Mond, and DE Patrick Jones II were healthy scratches today. 

NFC North Update
With Minnesota now at 1-2 I wanted to do a brief division update. 
Detroit has started off the year with 3 straight losses, two of them close losses under 7 points. They sit firmly at last in the division.
Chicago has started the year at 1-2 just like the Vikings. Their only win came last week at home against the Bengals. Their starting QB Andy Dalton was injured in that game, so rookie QB Justin Fields started for the Bears on Sunday. 
Green Bay plays on Sunday Night Football this week, so at the time of this week they have not finished their game yet. If they win, they will take undisputed 1st place in the division. Otherwise there will be a three-way tie for the division lead between Green Bay, Minnesota, and Chicago.
The division isn't doing too well this year, finishing last among all divisions in the first 2 weeks.

Up Next
Next week the Vikings will continue the homestand when they host the 2-1 Cleveland Browns. Kickoff is on Sunday, October 3rd at 12 PM CT on Fox.

​#SKOL