Detroit Lions October 16, post-game from the Detroit Lions’ 31-28 win against the Los Angeles Rams at Ford Field, Sunday, October 16, 2016
By the numbers…
LS DON MUHLBACH
In the 31-28 won over the Los Angeles Rams, LS Don Mulhbach played in his 186th career game moved past Hall of Fame CB Dick LeBeau (185) for the sixth-most games played in Detroit Lions history.
WR GOLDEN TATE
Tate’s 165-yard outing was his ninth career 100-yards game and sixth since joining the Lions. He now has three career 150-yard games, all since signing with Detroit in 2014. Including playoffs, Tate now has 10-career 100 yards games.
Among his 8 receptions included a 61-yard reception in the third quarter that set up the Lions’ third touchdown of the game. His 61-yarder is the second-longest reception of his career.
QB MATTHEW STAFFORD
Stafford’s 139.8 passer rating ranks as the second-highest single-game rating of his career and the highest in games with 30+ pass attempts.
His 139.8 rating set a single-game franchise record among Lions passers with 30+ pass attempts. QB Gary Danielson accomplished the previous best against Minnesota December 9, 1978 with a 138.1 rating. Today’s outing marked the fifth time in Stafford’s career he has garnered a 130.0+ passer rating with 30+ pass attempts.
Stafford tied the game with a 23-yard touchdown pass with 6:02 left in the fourth, and he then led the team on a 9-play, 44-yard drive that culminated in a 34-yard field goal to give the Lions the 31-28 lead. He now has tallied 23 game-winning drives during his career when trailing or tied in the fourth quarter or in overtime.
Thus far in 2016, Stafford fueled all three of the Lions wins with fourth quarter game-winning drives, including each of the past two weeks (31-28 vs. LA 10/16; 24-23 vs. Phi 10/9).
Since Jim Caldwell became the Lions head coach in 2014, Stafford leads the NFL with 11 game-winning drives in the fourth quarter or overtime.
Stafford has now thrown four touchdown passes in a game 10 times in his eight-year career. He became the sixth quarterback since 1960 to tally 10+ games with four touchdowns in a players’ first eight NFL seasons.
By tossing four touchdown passes against Los Angeles, Stafford, now with 14 touchdown passes on the season, moved past QB Bobby Layne (13 in 1951) for the second-most touchdown passes by a Lions quarterback through the first six games of the season. He trails only his own franchise mark of 15 touchdowns through the first six games of the 2011 season.
This marks the second time in Stafford’s career that he has accumulated a +10 TD-INT ratio over the first six games of the season. Thus far, he has 14 touchdowns to just four interceptions. In 2015, Stafford threw 15 touchdowns and had four interceptions (+11) through six games. Stafford is the only passer in team history to record a +10 TD-INT ratio over the first six games of the season.
WR ANQUAN BOLDIN
WR ANDRE ROBERTS
WR Andre Roberts caught one of the Lions’ four touchdown passes in the team’s 31-28 win over Los Angeles. His touchdown catch, the first with the Lions, occurred on 4th-and-2 at the Los Angeles 2-yard line with 3:12 left in the first half that tied the game at 14-14. Combined with his punt return touchdown earlier this season at Chicago (10/2), Roberts has become the ninth player in Lions history with a receiving and punt return touchdown in the same season and first since 2013 (WR Jeremy Ross).
Roberts’ touchdown occurred on fourth down and was his second career touchdown catch on fourth down. He also grabbed a fourth-down touchdown reception against Miami on September 30, 2012.
RB ZACH ZENNER
Second-Year RB Zach Zenner totaled a career single-game high of 77 yards from scrimmage, which included a career-high 58 rushing yards and 19 receiving yards. His 19-yard career long rushing attempt was part of the Lions’ fourth-quarter drive that tied the game at 28-28.
K MATT PRATER
K Matt Prater connected on a 34-yard field goal with 1:29 left to play in the game that gave the Lions their 31-28 final lead of the game. Prater now has 11 career game-winning kicks with less than 2:00 to play in the fourth quarter or in overtime, including three this season. Overall, he now has 15 game-winning or game-tying field goals with under 4:00 to play in the fourth quarter or in overtime.
Having connected on a game-winning field goal (under 2:00 in fourth or OT) in the last two weeks, he now has accomplished this in back-to-back weeks for the second time in his career. He also nailed game-winners in Week 13 (at Min 12/4) and Week 14 (vs. Chi 12/11) in the 2011 season while kicking for Denver.
S RAFEAL BUSH
S Rafael Bush picked off a Rams pass with 1:01 to play in the game that sealed the Lions’ 31-28 victory. The pick was Bush’s second of his career and first since joining the Lions.
OPENING DRIVES
The Lions capped off an 8-play 75-yard drive with a 7-yard touchdown pass from QB Matthew Stafford to WR Marvin Jones on the opening drive of the game. The Lions now have three touchdowns on opening drives in the six games the team has played this year.
LIONS HEAD COACH JIM CALDWELL FROM THE POST GAME PRESSER…
On if aggressiveness on fourth downs is an attempt to pressure the opponent: “It’s not any different than we’ve always done it. We’ve always kind of taken those opportunities when we thought they were there. We go after it, we try to be prudent with it. But, like I tell you, if you check it we’ve probably been in the upper echelon a number of times when we go for it on fourth down since I’ve been here. And so, I just think you have to commend our guys for standing up to the challenge because it’s not easy to get one yard in the National Football League. It’s a difficult task, and I think our guys upfront did a nice job.”
On the defense making impact plays to finish a game in consecutive weeks: “It wasn’t pretty, but they did a really nice job. It was kind of deceiving. We did hold them below 100 yards, which was our goal. We didn’t want to let (Todd) Gurley break our back, which we did. We wanted to let somebody else beat us. If they’re going to beat us, they’re going to beat us throwing or something of that nature, and (Kenny) Britt had a couple of great catches out there. And when you look at Case’s (Keenum) numbers, I mean, they were outstanding as well. But if we’re going to get beat that’s how we’re going to get beat, rather than them running the ball down our throat consistently.”
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