Detroit — The Lions defended their den one last time Sunday. And because they did, they’re still prowling in the playoff hunt.
But after Dan Campbell broke it down for his players in another raucous locker-room celebration, letting them know they’d set themselves up to be the NFL’s “hot game” next week in freezing Green Bay, he also had a message for the Lions fans who’d finished this season strong, just like his team is doing.
He began his postgame media session by thanking another standing-room-only crowd of 66,169 that showed up for Sunday’s home finale against Chicago and watched the Lions win going away, scoring 34 unanswered points in a 41-10 rout.
“It’s just a great, great environment to play in,” Campbell said. “When you’re a coach and a player and you really feel like you have home-field advantage, it’s a special feeling. Because there are teams in this league that don’t have that, even when they’re winning. So this is special.”
But the point he wanted to make, as the Lions get ready to hit the road for a huge game against the Packers — one that carries playoff implications for both teams — was that this is only the start.
“We’re gonna have a few more home games here down the road, in January,” Campbell said. “But as far as where we’re at right now, it doesn’t get any better than this.”
It has been six years since the Lions played a game after Christmas where they were still in contention for the postseason — backing into the playoffs in 2016 — and the longest-tenured player on Detroit’s current roster, Taylor Decker, was just a rookie back then.
But here they are again, in a spot no one would’ve predicted two months ago, not after a 1-6 start to Campbell’s second season in Detroit and coming off a 3-13-1 record in his 2021 debut. The Lions, winners of seven of their last nine games, will head to Lambeau Field this week with at least a shot at a wild-card berth.
“I think it means everything,” Campbell said. “It’s just so special. It’s as good as it can get. You get to go to Lambeau — historic Lambeau — where the tops of this division has been Green Bay every year for years. And (you get) to go earn your right, to potentially get in.”
And though they’d lost complete control of their playoff fate a week ago by getting manhandled in a humbling loss at Carolina, the Lions sure looked determined Sunday to keep hold of the rest. Campbell and his staff wanted to make sure of that earlier in the week, even going so far as to add a full-pads practice to the schedule Wednesday.
“We said, ‘We’re gonna get our identity back,’” Campbell explained Sunday. “And those guys did that. They trusted us, and they came out and it looked like we were ready to go. It looked like we were more physical.”
In the end, it was plain to see for everyone, too, as the Lions piled up 265 rushing yards while scoring on six of their first seven possessions. It was audible, too, as that Ford Field crowd roared as the defense survived a rocky start and then sacked the Bears’ Justin Fields seven times while allowing Chicago just 95 yards over the final three quarters.
“We knew it was going to be a playoff environment,” said Fields, who finished just 7-of-21 passing for 75 yards on the day. “The fans were loud out there, and they came with some juice today.”
The win completed a season sweep of the Bears, who’ve lost nine in a row under first-year head coach Matt Eberflus. It also guaranteed the Lions — now 4-1 against the rest of the NFC North this season — their first winning record in the division since 2017.
More importantly, though, it gives them everything to play for next weekend in Green Bay, and as Campbell put it, “I don’t think you’d want it any other way.” Aaron Rodgers and the Packers demolished the Vikings on Sunday, so they’ll be in as the No. 7 seed with a win over the Lions. Detroit needs a win in Lambeau and a loss or tie by Seattle at home against the Rams to grab that final playoff berth.
“It’s huge,” said Jared Goff, who had another nearly flawless outing Sunday, going 21-of-29 for 255 yards and three touchdowns against the Bears. “It’s where we want to be, playing the last game of the season and it means something.”
Particularly when you consider this is one of the NFL’s youngest rosters. Goff knows that feeling well from the start of his own career in Los Angeles, going from 4-12 as a rookie to 11-5 and the playoffs in Year 2 and then the Super Bowl the year after that. “And it’s not every team (where) young guys get the opportunity to play in games like this,” he said.
It’s not many teams, either, where you’ll find those young guys playing such vital roles, as they are in Detroit. Take On Sunday, the Lions’ rookies on the defensive front — Aidan Hutchinson, Josh Paschal and James Houston — combined for 5 ½ sacks, an interception and a fumble recovery. Next week, they’ll be trying to do something similar against the two-time reigning NFL MVP.
“I think this is what you want ‘em to taste,” Campbell said. “They need to feel this. They need to understand what this is. Because this has to become the norm.”
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And by ‘this’ he means more than just all that noise that was ringing in the new year at Ford Field on Sunday. He’s talking about the standard that helps to set, and the expectations that come with it. He’s talking about all the things he and general manager Brad Holmes spoke of when they were hired nearly two years ago. The same things those Lions fans have been hearing for decades, but rarely experiencing.
The fact that Campbell is talking about all this now says something about just how far they’ve come in a relatively short time. And also his confidence in where this is headed in relatively short order. Playoffs? Yes, they’re talking about playoffs, all right.
“I mean, you want to win a division championship as soon as you’re on the spot,” Campbell said. “But you also have a vision of where it needs to go. And I know this: We need to be competing for a division championship next year. I mean, that’s the goal. That’s what Brad and I set out to do. You do that, and then you’re able to get a home game — get you a couple home games — and now everything runs through Ford Field. It runs through Detroit. And, man, you like your odds a little better.
“But we’re still in this moment right now. We’ve got to go to Green Bay. I don’t want to look too far ahead. But that was always the vision, and if we don’t think like that, then we’ll never get there.”
So off they’ll go, then, with playoff hopes in tow. And now that the calendar has flipped, let that be the Lions’ resolution: There’s no turning back now.
john.niyo@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @JohnNiyo