A painful prep session for Packers

NASHVILLE - While the Vikings were rushing for 177 yards on 35 carries in Sunday's victory over Houston, the Packers were giving up 178 yards on 36 carries in a 19-16 overtime loss to the Tennessee Titans at LP Field.

So, Packers linebacker Brady Poppinga, whaddaya think the Vikings will try to do when the Packers visit the Metrodome for Sunday's battle of perfectly mediocre (4-4) second-place NFC North teams?

"I would envision seeing the Vikings do something similar with their running game because they're good at it and we had a tough time shutting that down today," Poppinga said. "Tennessee and Minnesota are very similar in a sense that they do a lot of zone blocking and zone [running] schemes, and both running backs for the Vikings [Adrian Peterson and Chester Taylor] also have the ability to see the vulnerable areas in the defensive front. Until we can stop it, we're going to see a lot of the same type of runs next week that we saw today."

The Packers defense played well enough to beat the Titans -- the NFL's only undefeated team at 8-0 -- but not well enough to escape part of the blame for a loss that came on a 41-yard field goal by Rob Bironas with 9 minutes, 41 seconds left in overtime.

Green Bay held the Titans to only three points on two fourth-quarter turnovers (one interception, one fumble) by quarterback Aaron Rodgers. But it also had zero takeaways and broke down against the run at two of the worst possible times in the game: in overtime and late in the second quarter after the offense had taken the lead and seized momentum.

The first breakdown came two plays after Rodgers' 5-yard touchdown pass to Donald Driver gave the Packers their only lead with 4:23 left in the first half. The Packers, who got 314 yards passing from Rodgers and 136 yards and seven catches from Driver, led 10-6 and had successfully silenced a rabid crowd of 69,143.

But not for long. A mere 15 seconds later, LenDale White busted a 54-yard run that led to a touchdown two plays later. The Packers would later tie the score 16-16 and dodge defeat when Bironas' 47-yard field goal attempt hit the right upright as regulation time expired.

White's 54-yard run looked like something right out of the Vikings' playbook. Facing second-and-10 from the Tennessee 26-yard line, the Titans' offensive linemen and tight end blocked in unison to their left. Their expert move kind of made them look like six really big synchronized swimmers.

White started to his left and cut quickly to his right as the Packers defense overpursued. Right offensive tackle David Stewart sealed Poppinga on the back side, creating a hole big enough that even the husky White could fit through.

"I think that run of all the runs hurt the most," cornerback Charles Woodson said. "Those kind of plays just take the air out of you."

The Packers played admirably, considering they had to shuffle their offensive line 90 minutes before kickoff when left tackle Chad Clifton became ill. Left guard Daryn Colledge was moved to left tackle, right guard Jason Spitz was moved to left guard and backup Josh Sitton was inserted at right guard. The line run-blocked well but struggled with pass protection, giving up four sacks and several knockdowns.

Defensively, the Packers sacked Kerry Collins twice but Johnson ran for 89 yards and a touchdown on 24 carries (3.7) and White ran for 77 yards on eight carries (9.6).