The Detroit Lions debuted their blue helmets in the Monday Night Football matchup against the visiting Las Vegas Raiders. The helmets looked great and so did the Lions defense in a 26-14 win that was a lot closer on the scoreboard than it should have been.
Detroit largely dominated the Raiders all night. The Lions nearly doubled the time of possession, more than doubled the first down battle (29 to 12) and more than tripled the total offensive yardage (487 to 157). Yet numerous mistakes from the home team prevented the game from being a monster win.
The Lions gave the ball away three times. Two of them came in Raiders territory, including a terrible pick-6 thrown by Jared Goff and a questionable call that ruled a red zone fumble by Craig Reynolds happened. Detroit’s red zone offense struggled all night, a combination of iffy play-calling decisions and some untimely poor execution.
The game shouldn’t have been close. The Raiders didn’t complete a pass to a wide receiver in the first half. Their offense picked up nine first downs in its first nine drives, six of which came on Las Vegas’ first scoring drive. Jimmy Garoppolo completed just 10 of his 21 passes for 126 yards and a red zone INT of his own that might be the easiest pick Kerby Joseph ever gets.
Las Vegas had no answer for the rookies on the Lions offense. Jahmyr Gibbs ran for 152 yards and a touchdown and added five catches for 37 yards. Sam LaPorta also scored on one of his eight receptions for 57 yards.
Detroit outgained La Vegas by 329 yards, the second-largest margin in any game all year. The one that topped it was Miami hanging 70 points on Denver and outgaining the Broncos by 363. Had the Lions avoided the costly giveaways, they could have handily doubled their 26 points.
The Lions hit the bye week at 6-2 and rebounded nicely from an ugly loss in Baltimore in Week 7. Las Vegas falls to 3-5.