Right This Moment, the Vikings Occupy an NFC Playoff Spot

With the Bills beating the Buccaneers on Thursday Night Football, the Vikings — at least for the next few days — are the new occupants of the seventh playoff spot in the NFC.

How's that for a turnaround? Just a month ago, this team was 0-3 and facing questions about the season falling apart. Now, after surviving close calls against the Panthers and Bears, losing a heartbreaker against the Chiefs, and pulling off a season-changing upset of the 49ers, the Vikings are right back in the wild card mix.

They're tied with four other teams, including Tampa Bay, at 3-4. Because the Vikings have the best conference record of that group (3-2), they hold the tiebreaker right now. Their head-to-head loss against the Buccaneers doesn't factor in because it's a tiebreaker that involves a bunch of teams who haven't all played each other.

It's obviously still very early in the 2023 season, which has 11 weeks to go. But to see the Vikings go from 0-3 to a playoff spot in a month is quite something, even if it's basically meaningless at this point in late October.

It's hard to overstate how huge that win over the 49ers was for the Vikings' season. Next up is a stretch of six consecutive games against mediocre-looking teams with a combined record of 16-25. At least according to ESPN's Football Power Index, the Vikings have a better than 50 percent chance to make the playoffs.

They just have to take care of business and win games. Do that, and they'll set themselves up to make the postseason — and maybe even make the NFC North race come down to the two late-season games against the Lions.

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