The Lions cost themselves the opportunity to retake the lead in the NFC North on Sunday with a 27-24 loss to the Vikings. With the Panthers upsetting the Packers at Lambeau Field, a win at home off their bye against a quarterback making his third career start would have propelled the Lions to the top of the division.

Instead of the Lions capitalizing on a favorable matchup and making their statement in the division, Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy was the story of the game. In his first game back from a high ankle sprain, McCarthy scored three touchdowns and led Minnesota to a much-needed victory. Meanwhile the swarming Vikings defense and special teams came through, sacking Jared Goff five times, holding them to 65 rushing yards and blocking a Lions field goal attempt.

The Lions had plenty of time and chances to come back and win the game, but they were simply unable to get past their own mistakes to make it happen.

“We did everything we needed to do to lose that game. We made every critical error you need to at the right time to lose it. Perfect storm,” Lions head coach Dan Campbell said after the game. “When you don't play well in all three phases, that falls on the head coach. I did not have them ready coming out of the bye. We made too many critical errors, man. Some of our disciple, our penalties caught up to us. We never looked comfortable and we just didn’t make enough plays. We had multiple opportunities to and we made none of them, really. I gotta clean up some stuff up.”

Campbell went on to call it one of the Lions' worst performances he's seen "in a while."

"It's probably one of the worst games we've played in a while," continued Campbell. "We looked rusty... that's evident that I didn't have 'em ready."

Goff said of the offense, "No concern, there's certainly an urgency with fixing things. ... There's a ton to fix and a ton of things to get better at. It’s a long season and we gotta get to it.”

The Lions fall to 5-3 on the season, just trailing the 5-2-1 Packers in the NFC North while the Vikings improve to 4-4 on the year.

Detroit will look to get back on track against the Commanders next week in a rematch of last year’s NFC divisional playoff game. Fortunately for the Lions, the Commanders hold one of the NFL’s worst defenses which will make it an opportune time for the offense to rebound.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Dan Campbell Had Blunt Comments After Lions’ Upset Loss to Vikings.

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