The Minnesota Vikings kicked off their quest to become the first team to play a Super Bowl in their own stadium with a home victory over the New Orleans Saints on Monday night.
As the fans filtered out of U.S Bank Stadium on Monday, they certainly had higher expectations of their team than they did before kickoff, and for good reason. The game wasn’t as close as the score suggested and it was one of the most complete Minnesota Vikings performances in recent memory.
A Vikings’ offense that gathered skeptics for their lack of production throughout the preseason proved their critics wrong as they played with an unseen swagger that was missing throughout the previous year. Defensively, Minnesota looked reminiscent of the unit that started 2016 red-hot, rather than the one that faded as the season wore on.
If both sides of the ball can perform consistently at the levels like they did against the New Orleans Saints, there will be talk of a Lombardi trophy making its way to Minneapolis.
Before we get too ahead of ourselves, join me as I break down the top five takeaways from the Vikings’ Week 1 excellent performance.