Lions’ ‘legion of whom’ secondary stifled Buccaneers in primetime

“We heard all the noise, ‘Secondary, whatever, whatever,’” Robertson said after the game. “But those guys went out there and played their hearts out and I had no doubt in them. I just wanted them to go out there and show everybody instead of talking about it. And that’s what I felt like they did tonight.”

On a night where the offense was expected to have to carry most of the slack, it ended up being Detroit’s defense that bailed them out time and time again. They forced two three-and-outs to start the game, while the Lions lost a fumble and turned it over on downs following a touchdown on the opening drive. 

The defense’s best sequence— and the offense’s worst– came at the end of the first half. On the first play of Tampa’s drive, Robertson punched the ball straight out of Bucs wideout Sterling Shepard’s hands and the defense fell on it for a fumble.

After Detroit failed to get a first down and missed a 54-yard field goal, the defense trotted back out there with Tampa having excellent field position. Mayfield found tight end Cade Otton over the middle who appeared to be wrestled to the ground by Maulet. 

But then Ford Field erupted. Had Maulet wrestled the ball away too? Officials stopped the game to review, before announcing that, after a “second look”, he had indeed snatched the ball from Otton’s grasp. Interception Lions.

The offense again couldn’t capitalize and instead produced an interception of its own, but the message– at least on defense– was clear: these guys could play.

“That's what's expected here,” head coach Dan Campbell said. “You get in there, you don't have to be perfect. You just challenge and compete and we will help you, and the guys around you will help you and we'll play with three units. But I love the fact the game did not feel too big for some of those guys.”

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Indeed it wasn’t. Hallett was the team's leading tackler with eight stops. The defense forced three straight turnovers on downs in the fourth quarter to slam the door, punctuated by a huge stop from Whiteside where he denied Egbuka in the end zone and stopped an 18-play Bucs drive dead in its tracks.

It was treated almost like an inevitability this week that Detroit’s secondary would be a liability in this game. Instead, they controlled it, aided by a masterful game from defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard, a stream of pressures from the defensive front and a berserk night from the linebackers.

This might be the only time we see some of these players this year with Branch, Joseph, Arnold and Reed all set to be back relatively soon. But they played their hearts out on Monday night, and maximized every last bit of opportunity they got. That’s the Detroit standard.

“The way this team is put together, man, we have a great leader in Dan, a great GM, owners, they put this team together,” Robertson said, sporting a Branch jersey after the game in a show of support for his suspended teammate. “They went and got the right guys, so that if any one of our great players goes down we got guys that could come in and step up and not have no drop off, man.”

The Lions, of course, would much rather be healthy than have to rely on an out-of-nowhere performance like this every week. They saw how last season ended, after all. But a game like this from a collection of backups and castoffs is the ultimate sign of how far their culture has come. 

Every team preaches “next man up”. The Lions live it.