The Minnesota Vikings outlasted the Green Bay Packers in a wire-to-wire NFC North game on Sunday afternoon. Vikings kicker Greg Joseph knocked through a 29-yard field goal to give his team 34-31 victory at home.
Minnesota possessed the ball for the last two minutes and eight seconds of the ballgame, which felt like an awfully time in the back-and-forth contest. During most of that final drive, the Vikings were figuring out ways to bleed the clock out to prevent Aaron Rodgers from getting the ball back.
Star running back Dalvin Cook actually had an opportunity to score a touchdown with just over a minute to play, but he went to the ground instead. After the Vikings win, he explained that the decision to pass up an easy score had everything to do with Rodgers’ penchant for late game heroics.
“I wanted to score so bad but I knew I couldn’t give Aaron Rodgers back the football,” Cook said, per The Athletic’s Chad Graff.
Dalvin Cook said he could’ve scored on his last carry with roughly 80 seconds left, but pulled up.
Cook: “I wanted to score so bad but I knew I couldn’t give Aaron Rodgers back the football.”
— Chad Graff (@ChadGraff) November 21, 2021
Cook is wise to have gone to the ground because few quarterbacks, if any, are better than Rodgers at leading the two-minute drill in the fourth quarter. Already this year, the reigning MVP led his Packers down the field and into field goal range for a game-winner against the 49ers. San Francisco had scored a touchdown with 37 seconds remaining in that contest, but even that was too much time for Rodgers to work his magic.
The Vikings didn’t want to be on the receiving end of those heroics, so Cook made the smart call. He also scored a touchdown earlier in the game, so he didn’t leave Sunday completely empty-handed.
Minnesota left the afternoon having improved to 5-5 and with its most impressive win of the year. The Vikings are now firmly in the NFC playoff picture with seven games left to play and plenty of favorable matchups still to come.
All because Cook didn’t let Rodgers get the ball back.
The post Dalvin Cook Has Brutally Honest Admission On Aaron Rodgers appeared first on The Spun.
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