After the Jacksonville Jaguars vs Minnesota Vikings week ten matchup, the Jaguars have fallen out of contention and are in a complete free fall. The Jaguars have nearly reached the boiling point, and emotions are running rampant. The team is on the verge of official playoff elimination, the star quarterback could be out for the season, and the coaching staff might be in their final weeks of coaching the Jaguars.
With all of the noise and pressure affecting the Jaguars, the whole team is on the hot seat. They need to find a way to turn down the heat before things get out of hand. They had their chances against the Vikings, but the issues plaguing the team all year came to a head, despite the defense playing well above their expectations. The Jaguars desperately need to self-reflect and learn from their mistakes if they want to have any chance of building off the defensive success and fixing the offensive woes. With a tough matchup in week 11 before their week 12 bye, the Jaguars have one more chance to play spoiler before things completely boil over.
How Can The Jaguars Turn Down the Heat?
The Jaguars had an opportunity to play spoiler but came up short on multiple occasions. Early in the season, they had entered a downward spiral following their loss to the Buffalo Bills, but their week ten game against the Vikings was the last straw for the Jaguars season. Heading into week ten, Jacksonville was coming off a week nine loss to the Eagles, where the offense had a porous first half and came soaring back in the second half. But, like most games the Jaguars have played, they couldn’t finish at the end. With the season unraveling as it has, there is little optimism for the season’s final seven weeks.
Not only is Trevor Lawrence hurt, and potentially done for the season, and he is one of the biggest names on the NFL injury report, but the team is becoming more undisciplined as time goes on. Travon Walker had a terrible penalty that ended the game, allowing the Vikings to get a free first down. While the Jaguars offense likely wouldn’t have made a drive down the field to win the game, the they had no chance with the Walker penalty. His one blunder is far from the only issue, but it showcases the overall issues plaguing the team from top to bottom.
Doug Pederson was passive-aggressive in the post-game press conference, and with little accountability coming from the head coach regarding the play on the field, the vibes are off following another close loss. Following such a disastrous loss, where the opportunity the win and play spoiler was within grasp, the Jaguars have a lot of self-reflecting to do before their last game before their bye week. Both sides of the ball displayed positives and negatives that Jacksonville can either build upon or correct heading into the home stretch of the season.
Defense Finally Plays To Their Potential
For the first time in 2024, the Jaguars’ defense finally played their best game and did so against a strong Vikings offense. Jacksonville has struggled to stop anyone all season, with the defense surrendering performances that were a team’s best. Caleb Williams and the Chicago Bears have struggled offensively nearly all year, but against Jacksonville, Williams had his best performance all season. Most teams up until week ten have had their best day, or one of their best days against the Jaguars’ defense. However, the defense finally had a good day.
Jacksonville held the Vikings offense down all day and didn’t allow a touchdown. A great defensive performance, and one the Jaguars sorely needed with Lawrence being out. If not for the defense coming up huge throughout the game, the Jaguars would’ve been blown out. The two areas that typically are associated with great defensive performances are sacks and turnovers. Surprisingly, the Jaguars only had one sack all day, from Walker. But the defensive line still got a ton of pressure on Sam Darnold.
Josh Hines-Allen had six pressures, Walker had four, Tyler Tracy had three, Arik Armstead had three, Yasir Abdullah had two, and Jeremiah Ledbetter had two. A collective effort to generate pressure, something that Jacksonville has struggled with all season. While the pressure only resulted in one sack and two hits, the pressure totals were in a much better place than they’ve been all year. These pressure numbers are something that Jacksonville can and should build upon going forward. The Vikings’ offensive line isn’t bad, and with a talented defensive line, the Jaguars should be generating pressure as they did against Minnesota when facing teams down the home stretch of the season.
While the pressures didn’t result in sacks, the Jaguars managed to get multiple interceptions, all of which were inside Jacksonville territory. The first interception came from a tip drill that bounced off Justin Jefferson and Tyson Campbell in coverage, right into the hands of Foyesade Oluokun. It was his first turnover of the season and the first interception of the day for a Jaguars defense that played its best ball.
The very next Vikings drive featured another interception, this time after a very long 17-play, 76-yard near-touchdown drive from the Vikings. Inside the Jaguars’ ten-yard line, Darnold tried fitting the ball into a tight window in the end zone to Jefferson, but Montaric Brown cut the pass off and made a diving interception. It was the best play he’s made as a pro and helped stop the Vikings from scoring a touchdown. Brown finished the day as the second-highest-graded defender in coverage according to PFF.
The third and final interception was once again a target to Jefferson deep down the field for a potential touchdown. From the Jaguars ‘ 18-yard line, Darnold threw a deep ball down the right sideline to Jefferson, but Darnell Savage cut in front of Jefferson, picking the ball off at the one-yard line. He then returned the interception 29 yards, but the ball was moved back to the 16-yard line of Jacksonville due to offsetting penalties by Tyler Lacy and Cam Robinson.
With three turnovers, all coming inside Jacksonville territory, and two in the end zone, the Jaguars’ defense came to play on Sunday. Another massive reason for the Jaguars’ success was the play of Ronald Darby. He had been much maligned coming into week ten, as one of the defensive backs giving up the most yards on the season. However, he played like his prime self against the Vikings, allowing only 36 yards on six targets and three receptions, to go with a pass breakup. He not only had the highest coverage grade amongst all Jaguars defenders according to PFF, but he also had the highest overall grade for every defender from the Jaguars’ dominant defensive performance against the Vikings.
Unfortunately for the Jaguars’ defense, the offense was about as poor as it could get, and all of their turnovers and stops amounted to nothing, with the Jaguars’ offense failing to capitalize on a single turnover. Each Jaguars interception was followed by a punt, and the only help the defense got was an early touchdown drive. But the offense just couldn’t get anything going against a strong Vikings defense.
The Offense Flounders With Jones
It was partially expected with the injury to Lawrence, that the offense would regress a bit. However, the degree of the regression, especially with Mac Jones, a former first-round pick, at quarterback, was staggering. The offense combined for 167 rushing and receiving yards, their lowest of the season and one of the worst performances of the 2024 season across all teams. There were multiple areas where Jacksonville struggled, as most of the offense played poorly.
Surprisingly, against a tough defensive front, the offensive line wasn’t a complete liability. The biggest issue for Jacksonville was the running backs’ pass protection, with both Tank Bigsby and Travis Etienne Jr. allowing sacks on their limited pass protection opportunities.
The issues started with the receiving game and the usage of the Jaguars’ best receivers. Evan Engram led the Jaguars in receptions and yards, with six catches for 40 yards. Brian Thomas Jr., who came into the week 10 matchup banged up, had only two receptions for 12 yards, by far the lowest in his rookie campaign. He wasn’t involved early enough, and if the Jaguars want any sustained success, they need to use him more down the stretch of the season. The only positive to take from the Jaguars pass game is the development of Brenton Strange into a solid asset, especially with Engram playing in the slot more with the injury to Christian Kirk.
Jones was the main reason why the offense couldn’t get anything going, as he struggled all day in his first start as a Jaguars. He had one good touchdown drive where he had a quarterback sneak touchdown to give Jacksonville the lead. But after that, he didn’t do anything to help the Jaguars win. A bunch of drives ending in punts leading into the fourth quarter meant that Jacksonville was playing behind every drive. Fortunately, the defense had kept the Jaguars offense within striking defense. While Jones hadn’t turned the ball over, that all changed in the fourth quarter.
On three straight drives in the fourth quarter, Jacksonville did the following: Two plays for negative four yards, and an aborted snap fumble recovered by Minnesota; Two plays for two yards, and an interception on a deep ball for Gabriel Davis; Finally, a five-play, 40-yard drive into Minnesota territory with under two minutes to go that ended in a deep ball interception to Daivs that was the dagger in the Jaguars chances.
Jones had limited the damage until the fourth quarter, but his play completely deteriorated at the end, and resulted in him turning the ball over on three straight drives, all of which were with the chance to take the lead against the Vikings. There’s no sugar-coating his performance, it was one of the worst fourth quarters possible for Jacksonville.
Going forward, the Jaguars desperately need to have Jones figure things out, as it seems likely that Lawrence will miss extended time, and potentially the rest of the season. While the Vikings provide a tough matchup, that doesn’t excuse Jones’ terrible play in the fourth quarter. Heading to the Detroit Lions for week eleven is a challenging matchup, even more so if the offense continues to turn the ball over three times in a game, let alone on back-to-back-to-back drives.
How Jacksonville Can Move Forward With Jones and The Defense
There is no single solution to the offensive woes, but there are a few simple adjustments that can and should be made. The first one is to throw the ball to Thomas more, as he is far and away the most dynamic receiver for Jacksonville. Using Engram is a good decision, but the offense needs more than one receiver to succeed. Thomas and Engram play off each other well, and with a sprinkling of Davis and Etienne in the receiving game, the offense should at worst be capable of moving the ball into field goal range. Banking on Jones to make the same plays as Lawrence is foolish. Jones can work well in an orchestrated offense, but with Press Taylor and Pederson running the show, the odds of Jones settling in seem low.
With that in mind, the path to success for the offense is to use the run game with Etienne and Bigsby, along with using Engram and Thomas in the passing game. Having so many routes for Strange and Luke Farrell isn’t how this offense figures things out. It sounds simple, but using the best players on designed plays, and allowing for yards after the catch, is how the Jaguars offense can function at an acceptable level to stay competitive in games. Just being competent is important, especially with how well the Jaguars’ defense played against the Vikings.
The big takeaway from this game was the Jaguars’ defense finally playing up to their potential, and how it can lead to success the rest of the season. It’s been a major theme of the 2024 season, that the Jaguars’ defense has been one of the worst, if not the worst, in the NFL. But they finally forced a couple of turnovers and held the Vikings to no touchdowns. A bend but don’t break defense can work, especially if the defense can generate turnovers. They’ve been bending, and breaking all season. But this performance was the first time the defensive philosophy of Ryan Nielsen worked to near perfection.
It’ll be hard for the Jaguars to match the defensive performance against the Vikings when facing the Lions in week 11, but the ingredients are present for Jacksonville to find success. Generating pressure with their defensive end duo, and the defensive backfield generating turnovers is all that can be asked of a defense. Nearly everything clicked for Jacksonville, and to continue that path is entirely up to the players. If Darby plays as he did against the Vikings, and Campbell and Brown continue what they’ve been doing all year, the defensive backfield should be able to more than hang around some of the best wide receiver rooms in the NFL.
Overall, it’s slowly devolving into a lost season for Jacksonville, but learning more from the young players down the home stretch of the season is exactly what the Jaguars should be looking for. While Pederson, Baalke, and the rest of the coaching staff returning is still up in the air, they should be closely monitoring the young players like Montaric Brown and Bigsby. With all of the heartbreak and the devastating losses, the Jaguars are all but out of the playoff hunt. It’s time, now more than ever, to not only play spoiler like they nearly did in the Jaguars vs Vikings week ten matchup, but also to prepare for the future of the team heading into 2025 and beyond.
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