Minnesota Vikings at Green Bay Packers - NFL Playoff Preview and Odds
The Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers will get together for the second time in six days on Saturday at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin. If the game on Saturday is as entertaining as the one six days prior, you won't want to miss it.
On Saturday, the Vikings played their way into the NFC Playoffs by beating the Packers on Blair Walsh's last second field goal 37-34. That result put the Vikings into the playoffs at 10-6 and knocked the Chicago Bears, also 10-6, out of the playoffs based on tie-breaker formulas. That resulted in Bears head coach Lovie Smith losing his job.
But the Vikings will go to the playoffs and everything is fine in Minnesota. Running back Adrian Peterson had a year that people will not soon forget, coming off a severe knee injury a year ago. He finished the campaign with 2096 yards on the ground, nine yards shy of the all time single season rushing record.
Quarterback Christian Ponder had his ups and downs, but he looked very good on Sunday against the Packers defense. He was 16 of 28 for 234 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions. He will need to play that well again on Saturday because even with all that, the Vikings only won by a field goal.
Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers was 28 of 40 for 365 yards, four touchdowns and no
picks. The thing is, nobody is surprised by this. Rodgers will likely do it
again on Saturday. With the game being at home, he might even play better.
Green Bay's leading rusher in the game was DuJuan Harris with 70 yards. That is
well short of Peterson's 199 yards. This is how the Vikings will have to win the
game. Peterson will have to have a big day. Can he do it? Yes. But this game is
going to outdoors on a frozen field, not like last week when they were indoors
on a fast track.
Vikings at Packers Odds
What do the odds makers have to say? Bodog has the Vikings +9 -130 and the Packers are -9 +110. Over/under is 46.
46 seems like a bit low considering these teams went for 71 points just last weekend. The game will be outdoors in freezing weather this week, but does that make a 26 point difference? We think not. So we'll pick the over.
Our Pick
Green Bay will be a tougher out this week. Last week, they were not playing in
an elimination game. It is true they did have incentive to win. Had they won,
they'd be already where they are now trying to get. That is the second round.
But this week, circumstances are even direr as another loss sends them home for
the off-season. But nine points? That's an awful lot of points in a playoff
game. We like the Vikings +9.
