Analysis: Vikings’ brittle recipe for success in pieces again after a loss in Dublin

DUBLIN – Kevin O’Connell’s voice was subdued as he rested his crossed arms on the table in the visitor’s interview room at Croke Park on Sunday evening. His gaze remained mostly fixed on that table, as he summarized the Vikings’ second frantic effort this season to extract a win from a game they had largely bungled.

“I thought the guys battled until the very end,” he said after a 24-21 loss to the Steelers. “Put ourselves in way too much of a hole, with clearly losing the turnover battle, and penalties continue to be a critical factor, something I’ve got to get fixed.”

The Vikings’ two fourth-quarter touchdown drives, sandwiched around a goal-line stand, still weren’t enough for them to become the first NFL team to leave Ireland with a regular-season victory. The Steelers intercepted two batted balls from Carson Wentz, who became the third Vikings quarterback in the calendar year to be sacked six times in a game while the team’s worrisome tally of offensive line injuries continued to get larger.

“That’s where you’re just never going to see this team quit,” O’Connell said. “They’re going to play to the end against a very good team. We just didn’t do enough things to overcome, either our own execution or the injuries or whatever. I don’t really look at anything other than we’ve got to improve and continue to grow as a team.”

The idea the 2025 Vikings could be a NFC contender was built, more or less, on three principles: Their defense would be even more disruptive because of offseason additions; their improved offensive line would create clearer running lanes and cleaner pockets; and their offense would be accessorized with enough veterans they could lean on as quarterback J.J. McCarthy developed. Their 24-6 loss to the Falcons in their home opener Sept. 14 introduced some rebuttals to that idea, and after that game they prepared to start Wentz as McCarthy had suffered a high ankle sprain. But their 48-10 victory over the Bengals last week sent them to Ireland brimming with confidence they had lined up all the elements that would help them win.

Their loss to the Steelers (3-1), however, again jabbed at the principles the Vikings (2-2) believed they could build on this season. Wentz operated under constant pressure, being hit 14 times by a pass rush that got four of its six sacks on third downs of 9 yards or longer. The Vikings, already playing without rookie left guard Donovan Jackson, lost two more starting linemen when right tackle Brian O’Neill injured his knee in the first quarter and center Ryan Kelly was found to have a concussion after halftime. O’Connell said O’Neill will have a magnetic resonance imaging exam on his knee Monday, adding the Vikings’ medical staff was concerned about a medial collateral ligament injury, while Kelly’s concussion was his second in three weeks and fifth of his career.

It all came in the first leg of the Vikings’ unprecedented international swing of back-to-back games in different countries, which the team agreed to because it meant trading tough road trips to Pittsburgh and Cleveland for environments that might be more neutral. And the loss, the Vikings’ first in five international games, meant Aaron Rodgers — the 41-year-old quarterback who won four MVPs in Green Bay and wanted to sign with the Vikings this offseason — would get the last laugh in his 31st and potentially final meeting with Minnesota.

The future Hall of Famer only threw eight passes in the second half after completing 12 of his 14 passes for 165 yards in the first, but he turned the game with a few vintage Rodgers throws: a third-down back-shoulder route to DK Metcalf over Jeff Okudah for 18 yards on the way to the Steelers’ first touchdown, and a second-quarter strike over the middle that Metcalf took 80 yards for a score that made it 14-3 Pittsburgh.

The Steelers, who were without starting running back Jaylen Warren, turned to Kenneth Gainwell for 14 second-half carries that netted 74 yards. He helped Pittsburgh build a 21-6 lead on his second touchdown of the day.

The lead grew to 18 on a Chris Boswell field goal in the fourth quarter, as Pittsburgh sacked Wentz three times on the Vikings’ first three drives of the second half and set up Gainwell’s score with T.J. Watt batting and intercepting a Wentz pass in the third quarter.

“A couple tipped picks, I’m not going to lie, those are tough,” Wentz said. “They kind of derailed — I thought we had some decent momentum going on a couple drives."

But with about eight minutes left in the game, Vikings running back Zavier Scott made a superb catch in the back of the end zone, leaping to snare Wentz’s pass while getting both of his feet inside the back line. After a review upheld the touchdown, Wentz hit Jalen Nailor for a two-point conversion to make the score 24-14. Then, after stopping Gainwell on fourth-and-goal from the 3, the Vikings went 99 yards on their next drive, gaining 81 to the Steelers 1 on Wentz’s shot to Jordan Addison against busted coverage.

The lost seconds became especially critical in the end-of-game sequence that wouldn’t have happened the same way in the United States.

O’Connell said officials let both teams know “about three minutes before kickoff” that the play clock in the end zone would be turned off, and the official clock would be displayed on the ribbon board between the upper and lower decks. Wentz managed it throughout the game by peering over his shoulder to look at the play clock, rather than being able to check the typical endzone clock in his field of vision.

After another fourth-down stop, the Vikings reached their own 39 with a chance to set Will Reichard up for a tying field goal. But Wentz took an intentional grounding penalty while retreating from Nick Herbig’s pressure, pushing the Vikings back to their own 23 with 28 seconds left. The Vikings were out of timeouts when Wentz hit T.J. Hockenson for 14 yards, forcing them to spike the ball on third-and-12. But they were penalized for a delay of game on fourth down, as O’Connell motioned for more time to be added to the play clock after the spike and Wentz pointed toward the inoperative clock in the end zone.

“That was a critical, critical penalty, and then I think we might have got beat on a [tackle-end exchange stunt] on the intentional grounding,” O’Connell said. “Had an opportunity maybe to get a pretty significant chunk” of yardage.

The clock was one of Dublin’s two curveballs for the Vikings; the other came before halftime, when Justin Jefferson slipped on the grass while turning the corner on a 29-yard catch to the 13-yard line, a play where the receiver said he would have “for sure” beaten linebacker Payton Wilson to the end zone. Wentz got poked in the left eye on the drive and threw incomplete for T.J. Hockenson on a play where O’Connell said the QB’s eyesight might have affected his accuracy. He then lofted a pass toward the end zone that Darius Slay nearly picked off before the Vikings settled for three points.

It all put the Vikings in a position that was a little too much to overcome, with an offensive line that was a little too depleted to handle the Steelers pass rush, and against a legendary quarterback who still had a little too much left.

Their first international loss does not have to be the one that disproves their thesis about the 2025 season. But as they packed up for London, and a game against the Browns they need to win before a week off and a nasty post-bye stretch, they left Croke Park with nagging questions about how they can line it all up.

“Definitely a sick taste in our mouth,” Jefferson said. “Just hurting ourselves, really.”