This version of the Vikings is so much better than 2022

As the Vikings earned a 23-22 win over the Arizona Cardinals at US Bank Stadium on Sunday, they entered the locker room. Head coach Kevin O’Connell gathered his players in a circle and gave his postgame speech.

The intimate moment has become a deadline for the fan base because the Vikings post the video on social media immediately after every win.

The gist of the postgame speech this time was about the fact that while the Vikings didn’t play their best game, they now have a 10-2 record and everything they want to accomplish is still ahead of them.

“All we want is 60 minutes once a week, no matter how long they let us play,” O’Connell told his players, adrenaline pumping up and down through his veins. “We’re just going to keep tracking it and tracking it and tracking it.”

The unwavering belief that O’Connell has long had in this particular group of players can be traced back to training camp.

It doesn’t matter that no one expected much from the Vikings at the time, as Las Vegas prognosticators had set their forecast at 6½ wins and a particular ESPN simulation model predicted that they would perform so poorly that they would be tied for the No. 1 seed in the would complete the overall ranking.

O’Connell didn’t concern himself with the stories then, and they certainly don’t concern him now. He firmly believes the Vikings have what it takes to compete for the Super Bowl, and they appear capable of doing so.

Why is it still so difficult for a large part of the fan base to settle in? The answer to that question is deeply rooted in the heartache that has plagued this franchise since its inception in 1961.

Those who follow the Vikings religiously have protected their hearts by operating with a cynicism that all but guarantees that nothing good will ever happen to them. They can’t be let down if they never believed in the first place, right?

The most recent example of this self-fulfilling prophecy came during the 2022 season, when the Vikings entered the playoffs with a 13-4 record and were promptly defeated by the New York Giants in the first round. The scars of that disappointment seem to have shaped the way the fan base has digested everything that has happened so far in the 2024 season.

The problem with this line of thinking is that this version of the Vikings is much better. Confusing the 2022 season and the 2024 season is wrong as they are not nearly the same.

While the recent escape acts feel similar, they pale in comparison to the escape acts the team needed in 2022 to produce wins on a weekly basis.

The perfect 11-0 record in games decided by a single possession was a statistical anomaly that led to a double-doink in London over the New Orleans Saints, about a million things going in their favor beating the Buffalo Bills, and the greatest comeback of all time involved beating the Indianapolis Colts.

To name just a few.

As fun as this version of the Vikings was—improbable win after improbable win after improbable win—it required too much luck to be a sustainable model of success. That’s not the case with this version of the Vikings, because there wasn’t much luck involved at all.

After overwhelming their opponents with an impressive 5-0 start, the Vikings dropped two games in a row, only to immediately bounce back with another 5-0 win in which they were almost always in control regardless of the final result.

Now the Vikings are entering the home stretch with games against the Atlanta Falcons, Chicago Bears, Seattle Seahawks, Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions. Then come the playoffs, where this version of the Vikings gets a chance to prove once and for all that they are indeed better than O’Connell’s first team, the Vikings.

“My goal from the start was to get to a point where we could play with a chance to peak in December,” O’Connell said. “There’s certainly an opportunity for our team to do that.”