Game Summary
The Vikings racked up 386 yards of total offense, held the NFL’s leading passer to just 175 yards, registered 21 first downs compared to Pittsburgh’s 14 and enjoyed a 14-minute edge in time of possession, but it wasn’t enough to pull off an upset win over the Steelers at Heinz Field on Sunday.
Pittsburgh, behind 2 late defensive TDs, held off a late-charging and resilient Vikings bunch 27-17 in a game that lived up to its billing as the NFL marquee matchup of the week.
Pittsburgh’s most impressive drive of the day, an 8-play, 91-yard masterpiece by QB Ben Roethlisberger and Co., gave the home team a slight 10-7 advantage at halftime. But the Vikings surged in the 2nd half behind 242 passing yards from QB 
Trailing 13-10 with 8:16 to play in the game, the Vikings were knocking on the door and had the ball 1st and goal on Pittsburgh’s 10-yardline. Favre hit WR
Favre was able to move the Vikings back up to the 8-yardline with 6:42 to play, but then on 3rd down DE Brett Keisel sacked Favre and forced a fumble. LB LaMarr Woodley gathered the ball and returned it 77 yards for a stunning TD that pushed Pittsburgh’s lead to 20-10.
Refusing to be denied, the Vikings stormed back again thanks to an 88-yard kickoff return for a TD by
The Vikings took over on their own 26-yardline with just 3:21 to play and trailing by 3. Favre and Peterson quickly moved the Vikings up the field. On 3rd and 4 from the 45-yardline, Peterson hauled in a short pass, turned up field and steamrolled a Steelers defender along the way to a 29-yard pickup down to the Pittsburgh 26-yardline. Two plays later, the Vikings were poised for another dramatic victory, but Favre had his pass graze off the fingertips of RB
It was over when…
On 2nd and 3 at the Steelers 19-yardline, trailing 20-17 but in position to tie the game at worse and take the lead with a TD at best, a short pass from Brett Favre went off RB Chester Taylor’s fingertips and deflected into the lap of Pittsburgh LB Keyaron Fox, who returned it 82 yards for the game-clinching TD.
Highlights
-- With CB
-- WR Sidney Rice continued his breakout season with another star performance, hauling in 11 receptions for 136 yards. He caught what would’ve been the game-winning TD late in the 4th quarter, but a dubious tripping penalty negated the play. Rice also had another 35-yard reception taken away because of a holding penalty earlier in the 4th quarter. Rice leads the Vikings in receptions with 34 and receiving yards with 545.
-- WR Percy Harvin added to his sensational rookie season with another kickoff return for a TD, his 2nd of the season. This one was of the 88-yard variety and occurred in crunch time, with his team trailing late in the 4th quarter. On the play, Harvin sprinted through a crease near the left hashmark and bolted down the sideline, eventually cutting back toward the middle of the field and out-sprinting the Steelers kick coverage team to the endzone. The score put Minnesota back in the game at 20-17 and directly answered a long fumble return by Pittsburgh’s defense just moments earlier.
-- He didn’t have another 100-yard game and he wasn’t able to shake loose for a highlight-caliber TD jaunt, but Peterson must be commended for his effort on Sunday. He came into the game a marked man and went up against a fierce, hard-hitting defense. Yet he still managed to gain 69 yards on 18 carries. More impressive, though, was that he was involved in the passing game. He had 4 receptions for 60 yards and picked up a number of crucial blocks in pass protection.
-- Steelers WR Hines Ward came in as the NFL’s leading receiver (in terms of yards), but the Vikings defense, even without Winfield, shut Ward down and yielded just 1 reception for 3 yards to #86.
-- In a tough environment and trailing for much of the game, the Vikings were resilient and surged in the 2nd half, instead of succumbing to the raucous home crowd and physical Steelers defense. Favre paced the Vikings offense in the 2nd half and racked up 242 passing yards in the 3rd and 4th quarters along the way to a gutty 34 of 51 passing effort that netted 334 yards. Favre made several heady plays on the afternoon and marched the offense down the field twice late in the 4th quarter to put the team in position to win the game.
-- With Winfield out, 3rd round CB
-- The Vikings were 9 of 18 (50%) on 3rd downs, continuing solid play on the game’s most important down.
-- The Vikings came into Sunday’s game with the #2 red zone defense and they may jump to #1 after holding the Steelers scoreless on 3 trips inside the 20-yardline.
-- DT
A few things to work on…
-- Penalties were a killer for the Vikings. They had 11 penalties enforced against them for 78 yards, including the tripping penalty late in the game that negated the go-ahead score.
-- By and large, the pass protection for Favre on Sunday was actually pretty good. The Vikings gave up 4 sacks, but 2 of them came in the 1st quarter and another one occurred early in the 2nd (the last one came on the game’s final play). So while it’s a positive that Favre was kept clean for a good portion of the game and for almost the entire 2nd half, the sacks early in the game prevented the Vikings offense from getting something going right away.
-- P
-- The Vikings defense should be commended for the game they played on Sunday, holding Roethlisberger to just 175 yards passing. But there were some missed tackles again that allowed the Steelers to gash the Vikings defensively and drive down the field for scores.
What They Were Saying…
-- “It was a game of swings. I’m proud of my guys, fighting back. I hate the result, but I thought they put themselves in a position to be able to win that football game. Hats off to Pittsburgh; they found a way to make a couple of plays.” – Vikings Head Coach Brad Childress
-- “We're pretty fortunate to win that football game, to say the least. When you look at the stats, and you look at some of the things that happened in that game, usually you don't win those.” – Steelers Head Coach Mike Tomlin, quoted by the Pioneer Press
-- “We needed to get more points in the red zone, we didn’t need to give up the fumble for a touchdown. There were a lot of reasons we didn’t win, the red zone was one of them.” -- QB Brett Favre
-- “You know I didn’t like it because Jeff Dugan is sitting there with a knot on his thigh on a tripping penalty. We blocked ‘eight-seven double-snag fullback flat’ a thousand times and cut the defensive end just like we cut the defensive end there. So you know, that’s football, cutting the end of the line of scrimmage.” – Childress on the questionable tripping penalty called against Dugan
-- “Clearly I felt like this was the best defense we’ve faced this year. We knew these guys would be resilient and fight hard. Anything that we were going to get, we were going to have to take.” – RB Adrian Peterson on playing against the defending Super Bowl champs.
-- “It was a freak game. We're not upset. We played good as a whole team, and we're disappointed. We knew it would be a dogfight, and we were biting back. But at the end of the day, they got the win and we got the loss, so we got to go back to the drawing board.” – DT Pat Williams, quoted by the Pioneer Press
-- “I’m proud of them. It’s just important to learn from this [and] put it behind us. Our guys have never been afraid to learn from any mistakes. Go to Green Bay and go to the bye 7-1. That’ll be huge.” – Childress
-- “I can’t tell you much; he’s just on the mend. Really it’s a week-to-week deal. He made a lot of progress last week and we’ll just see how he progresses this week. I thought those guys that played in his stead did a nice job on the roll in there from the nickel to the corner to the nickel position.” – Childress on CB Antoine Winfield’s injury
