What the Lions need to continue winning

Taking a live look at Ford Field. The Lions got a big win over the weekend against the Packers yesterday. Big divisional win, NFC North. They're going to continue NFC North play coming up this Sunday against the Minnesota Vikings. It's going to be a 1 o'clock game at Ford Field. Look, the Lions are going to try to go 2-0 in the division against a Minnesota Vikings team that we still have questions about. We're going to have a quick Lions conversation with Matthew Thomas. Matthew, how are you doing? I'm good. Hey, so Matthew's with the Talk Within Reach podcast. You guys talk Lions. You guys talk sports. We appreciate you joining us, man. So what did you think of the game yesterday? Great game. Not how I envisioned it. I thought it was going to be offensive, just battle back and forth. And it's interesting that it was a little bit lower scoring game than I thought. I got to ask, what's your biggest takeaway? because there were three plays that really stuck out. Two of them involved Jameer Gibbs. So near the end of the game, the Packers looked like they were going to let Jameer Gibbs score because they still had one timeout left, and then he decided to go down. And then on the other end, right before they kicked that game-winning field goal, Jameer Gibbs looked like he could have run that touchdown in and put the Lions up a touchdown, but it would have given the Packers back the ball. Look, this guy's third year in. How impressed are you with just his awareness and how the Lions were able to close out that game? Yeah, that comes down to coaching because you tell your guys that going into that play. So I love that he was smart enough to actually do it. You've seen some people, you know, fall into the end zone, even though they know they're supposed to stop there. I don't like that he kind of tweaked his ankle. Like, I want to wait and see. Hopefully he's all right after that. But, you know, you know that he's going after those touchdowns, being the sole back this year. Touchdown after touchdown, what we've seen each week. so far that he's able to still do a team effort of he knows the team can win if he just sits short of the goal line and that's what was so awesome to see that he embodied that he stood there so that they could win the game instead of going after what i think that was my early prediction of of him going after LT's record this year um in the backfield i think he was smart enough to just hold it up and Lions got the win defensively look man uh there's been a lot of questions coming out about this defense, a lack of key players in the secondary. We got Brian Branch back. He had a big play near the end of the game there. He looks like he's still on the mend, but it was good to have him back, and we could see the difference there. Jack Campbell has had some questions about his play at linebacker, but what impressed you about the defense, and what's impressed you really the last couple of games between Green Bay and Arizona? Yeah, so I'll be the first one to tell you. you know the secondary is what I what I talk about all the time of you know what needs the most improvement throughout the year so you know I I've been discouraged with with Shep's you know kind of year of growth so far um but it seems like they kind of got that together because if you can shut down Christian Watson if you can shut down Matthew Golden like those are the guys that can absolutely excel like you saw unfortunately Olave week one just absolutely you know sent us through the wringer uh Tetairo McMillan set us through the ringer there so uh it was really neat to see the ability to shut down those those guys and you know that that leads you into can they do it again next week because you've got a superstar Justin Jefferson that now you have to lock down just like you did Christian Watson and Matthew Golden so that's to me that's that's awesome to see the improvement in the secondary there we got about a minute left i was gonna ask you about Justin Jefferson look the vikings uh their offense hasn't lit the world on fire i mean they they scored 16 against the colts yesterday uh they still won they're undefeated uh but they're coming here to Ford Field do you think the lions give them their first loss absolutely without a doubt the lions you know i've been to a couple of these games here where you know the Detroiters the crowd absolutely get into it so to have that atmosphere uh what what i think it's it's really going to be tough on the defensive side against them can our powerhouse offense go against that Brian Flores defense because they they look amazing there too so um it's gonna be a tough one you plan on being there no i won't be there okay be watching from home all right i will too uh we'll cheer them on from home hopefully they pull out this win uh matthew man we appreciate you joining the show thanks for having me hey anytime oh hey real quick let people know where they can find you absolutely talks within reach we do our video podcast on YouTube uh you can find us on the clips on on all socials but YouTube is where we do our episodes all right man appreciate you we'll chat again soon thank you no problem appreciate matt we appreciate