Minnesota Vikings: Studs and duds from Week 4 vs. Texans

Stud: Finally getting a win

The ultimate stud that resulted from Minnesota’s Week 4 performance against Houston was that the Vikings were finally able to crack into the win column and secure the first victory of the 2020 campaign.

Minnesota began the season 0-3 overall and have quickly dropped in both the NFC North and NFC standings, and it was incredibly important for this team to begin to try and bounce back from that early-season deficit to get the first win of the new year.

With the rest of the NFC North division already securing at least one win on the year, including both the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears entering Week 4 undefeated atop the division standings, the Vikings needed to get a win in an early-season must-win game this weekend to begin the process of erasing that deficit behind the rest of the pack.

How this win will carry over to Week 5 and beyond is yet to be seen. But at least Minnesota was able to finally get into the win column now riding into next week’s slate of games.

Dud: Nearly giving up the lead late

Although Minnesota was able to jump out to a decent-sized lead early on in the game and as a result could coast for the rest of the matchup to pull out the victory, the Vikings made things more interesting than they perhaps should have been late in the contest on the road in Houston.

With a 31-16 lead in the fourth quarter, Minnesota was sitting in a comfortable spot to be able to ultimately get the win in Week 4, but Houston didn’t give up and made things closer than the Vikings would have liked in the final quarter of play.

The Texans added a touchdown late to narrow the game to a 31-23 contest and had a chance to even tie the game up late, but a touchdown reception by Will Fuller was overturned in the endzone and resulted in Minnesota taking over on downs to run the clock out.

The Vikings haven’t been in many late-game situations were they held a lead so far in 2020, so this is a learning opportunity for Minnesota. But it’s one the Vikings hope they don’t have to face very often for the rest of the year.