Breaking: Lions’ Winning Ways Reach Historic Heights
After last Sunday’s win 52-6 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars, in the scope of deciding when to pull starters from a one-sided game like that, Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell noted the uniqueness of having three of those kind of games.
“This is a weird – this is another one of those bizarre things that you’re running into”, Campbell said. “Normally, this doesn’t happen. It’s just like the third time this has come up this season…”
That 46-point dismantling of the Jaguars is the Lions’ third win by at least 38 points this season, following their 47-9 win over the Dallas Cowboys in Week 6 and their 52-14 win over the Tennessee Titans in Week 8.
Some outside critics have come out regarding what the Lions have done in those games, from questioning Campbell’s character to lamenting how they seem to want to embarrass the other team. We’ve seen the expected response to that from a couple Lions’ players, and Campbell has noted the challenge of when to pull starters from those kind of games.
Lions are in historic territory regarding blowout wins
The Lions have outscored their opponents by an average of more than two touchdowns per game so far this season, with a big chunk of that +159 point differential coming in the three 38-plus point wins (151-29 combined score).
38 points might be considered kind of an odd marking point. But no other team has won one game by at least that margin this season and the Lions have done it three times in 10 games. There’s also historical context for a team having multiple games with that margin of victory in a season.
As noted by Michael David Smith of Pro Football Talk, seven other teams in NFL history have had exactly three 38-plus point wins in a season (counting the regular season and the playoffs). No team has done it four times in a season.
The Lions have seven more regular season games, plus playoff games that are looming/likely, to get their fourth win by at least 38 points this season. That seems unlikely to happen, but nothing seems to be out of the realm of possibilities for this team and they have time to get it done.
