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• Record: 6 wins and 8 losses
• Elsewhere on the Web
• Lions Photos and Videos
• 2007 Schedule and Results
• Week One
• Week Two
• Week Three
• Week Four
• Week Five
• Week Six
• Week Seven
• Week Eight
• Week Nine
• Week Ten
• Week Eleven
• Week Twelve
• Week Thirteen
• Week Fourteen
• Week Fifteen
From jr's workspace   

Detroit Lions 2007

Record: 6 wins and 8 losses

Elsewhere on the Web

Lions Photos and Videos

2007 Schedule and Results

Week One

Detroit 36, Oakland 21

Detroit Free Press Photos

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit01071936
Oakland0014721

Week Two

Detroit 20, Minnesota 17, OT

Detroit Free Press Photos

Box Score

1234OTTotal
Minnesota07100017
Detroit01070320

Week Three

Eagles wear "throwback" jerseys in annihilation of the Lions. Detroit Free Press photos

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit7140021
Philadelphia21217056

Week Four

Lions score 34 points in the fourth quarter, which is an NFL record, to defeat the Bears.

Yahoo! and Detroit News photos :

Box Score

1234Total
Chicago0761427
Detroit3003437

Recap

The Detroit Lions did it all in a record-breaking fourth quarter, scoring on the ground, through the air on defense and special teams. The new-look win took the place of a here-we-go again loss for a team that used to be the NFL's laughingstock. No other team in league history can say they scored 34 points in the final quarter as Detroit did against the defending NFC champions, and no game included a combined 48 points in the fourth. It was the kind of game Detroit used to lose as it put together one of the worst six-season stretches in NFL history -- with at least 10 losses from 2001-2006 -- but these might not be the same-old Lions.

After four games, the Lions equal the number of wins they had for the entire 2006 season.

The Lions play next at the Washington Redskins.

The combined record thus far of the three teams the Lions have defeated is 4-8. The Redskins are 2-1, and they had their bye week this past weekend.

Week Five

Once again, the Lions get pounded on the road by an NFC East team. This time it was the Redskins.

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit00303
Washington01421834

Recap

Kitna was so ineffective that Detroit uncharacteristically tried a run-first attack after halftime. With Kevin Jones taking over for Tatum Bell, the Lions moved the ball well until killing their drives with self-inflicted mistakes, including a botched handoff, a dropped pass and a false start.

As far as the NFC East goes, the Lions play the Giants and Cowboys in Detroit later in the season. The Lions are off next week, and then they're at home against the 3-2 Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Week Six

Bye Week

Week Seven

Detroit 23, Tampa Bay 16

The Lions lost in the stats but won on the scoreboard where it counts.

Yahoo! photos :

Box Score

1234Total
Tampa Bay070916
Detroit1033723

Recap

The Detroit Lions took advantage of both uncharacteristic miscues with touchdowns to beat their former quarterback and another NFC team with a winning record. Calvin Johnson scored on a 32-yard run midway through the fourth quarter after Garcia's second fumble, and the spectacular play proved to be the difference in a 23-16 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday.

Team StatsTBDet
Time of Possession35:5024:10
Total Plays7747
First Downs2717
Total Net Yards422278
Net Yards Russhing124147
Net Yards Passing298131

Next game is with the 3-4 Chicago Bears who are already talking a little good trash.

It was literally pinned to a bulletin board Monday. It was also displayed on a door and taped inside the lockers of offensive linemen Dominic Raiola and Stephen Peterman. It was an item from freep.com with the headline: "Bears' DT Harris tells Lions they shouldn't plan on leaving Chicago with a win next week."

Week Eight

Detroit 16, Chicago 7

Yahoo! photos :

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit0130316
Chicago00707

Recap

[T]he Detroit Lions are 5-2 for the first time since 2000. Jon Kitna passed for 268 yards, Kevin Jones ran for 105 yards and a touchdown, and the Lions again showed they're serious contenders in the NFC with a 16-7 victory over the Bears on Sunday.

The negatives :

Free Press :

There aren’t many who could pull off the disgraced assistant coach look as a Halloween costume, but when you’re the unquestioned leader of a surprising 5-2 football team, you’re more likely to get a free pass for poor taste. Kitna was the center of attention at the Mike Furrey Foundation’s charity Halloween party Monday night in Plymouth. He and his wife, Jennifer, raised eyebrows when they revisited one of the more embarrassing episodes in Lions’ history. Kitna came dressed as a “naked” Joe Cullen while his wife resembled a Wendy’s drive-thru attendant.

Cullen, the Lions’ defensive line coach, was arrested Aug. 24, 2006, in Dearborn for alleged indecent and obscene conduct for driving on a public street while nude. Cullen pulled his sport utility vehicle into a late-night Wendy’s drive-thru. The attendant discovered that he was naked. Cullen was asked to wait in the restaurant parking lot while they prepared his order. The restaurant manager notified police. Cullen later pleaded no contest to driving while nude.

What was Kitna thinking? Was such brazenness another example of the swashbuckling cowboy attitude that has made him the emotional and spiritual backbone of the Lions locker room? The stunt was consistent with Kitna’s in-your-face style. If you don’t like what he says or what he does, that’s tough. He’s not changing. But he crossed the line this time and owes Cullen an apology, if for nothing else but for pushing that embarrassing evening back to the forefront of local consciousness.


The Lions now have two road wins for a total of five wins against four teams. And at this point of the season, none of those teams the Lions defeated has a winning record.

I think the Lions were more fortunate than better than their opponents in the last two games, but a win is all that matters.


The Lions next four games :

Two of the top NFC teams in five days. Both at home. A real test to see where the Lions are at relative to the rest of the conference, just in case the 'p' word starts to get tossed around. Playoffs.

Week Nine

Monster home win for the Lions who pounded Denver 44-7. Denver scored their only points with about three minutes left in the game.

Yahoo! photos

Box Score

1234Total
Denver00077
Detroit313141444

Recap

The Lions highlight of the season thus far is this play :

Shaun Rogers intercepted a screen pass and the 340-pound defensive tackle rumbled 66 yards, scoring after stiff-arming Selvin Young to make it 37-0 in the fourth quarter.

Rogers snatched the pass out of the air. He didn't catch a tipped pass nor a deflection. He reached up and made a nice grab. And his stiff-arm around the 10-yard-line was textbook. The would-be Bronco tackler crumpled under the big paw of Rogers.

Week Ten

More like the old Lions with Detroit bumbling and stumbling and looking pathetic in losing to the Arizona Cardinals 31-21.

Yahoo! photos

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit707721
Arizona3147731

Recap

Kurt Warner, playing with a torn ligament in his left (non-throwing) shoulder, shook off an early interception to complete 26 of 36 passes for 259 yards and three touchdowns.

"We looked terrible today," wide receiver Roy Williams said, "real terrible." Jon Kitna was 32-of-45 for 294 yards, including two touchdowns to Roy Williams, but he was intercepted twice and fumbled twice, accounting for four of the Lions' five turnovers.

"Missed tackles, 11 penalties, five turnovers, and our coverage units weren't very good," coach Rod Marinelli said. "That covers our entire football team." The Lions had minus-18 yards rushing, the second-fewest allowed in Cardinals' history. They were the Chicago Cardinals when they held Detroit to minus-24 yards on Oct. 13, 1946.

Lions play the Giants (6-3) and the Packers (8-1) in five days, both at home. Then the Lions play at the Vikings (3-6) and then home against the Cowboys (8-1). Going 2-2 in the next four games would be quite an accomplishment for the Lions.

Week Eleven

NY Giants 16, Detroit Lions 10

Two weeks ago, Detroit scored 44 points at home against Denver. Ah, those were the days.

Yahoo! Photos

Box Score

1234Total
NY Giants373316
Detroit003710

Recap

Strahan had a season-high three sacks, helping the New York Giants beat the Detroit Lions 16-10 Sunday to gain the advantage in the NFC wild-card race. New York (7-3) broke a third-place tie with Detroit in the conference and improved its chances of making the playoffs. In the Super Bowl era, 78.4 percent of teams that won seven of their first 10 games ended up in the postseason.

The Lions (6-4) dropped back-to-back games for the first time this year, and took it hard after losing their other three games by double digits. "Yeah, it's more difficult because that is not a better football team than us," quarterback Jon Kitna said. "We gave them the football game."

Strahan took offense to Kitna's take on the game. "I honestly thought in the first half that was one of the worst teams we played that was 6-3," he said. "I don't quite understand why Jon would say that. "Maybe we'll see them down the road and if that's the case, we'll beat that a-- again."

"They scored 31 points a game here," Strahan said. "The way we played today we should be very happy."

But Kitna threw three interceptions, overshadowing the 28 passes he completed for 377 yards and a score. McDonald and Roy Williams both went over the 100-yard mark as the Lions were forced to throw because they could not run. Kevin Jones was limited to just 25 yards on 11 carries.

One of Kitna's ints may not have been his fault. But Kitna obviously makes bonehead decisions off the field. First, his tasteless Halloween costume and now making idiotic statements about the NY Giants. A poor decision-maker off the field can lead to the same thing on the field.

Something's wrong when the QB throws for 377 yards, but the team only scores 10 points.

The Lions are now 1-2 after Kitna's Halloween costume. Maybe Kitna has let a jinx get put on the Lions. Or the Lions are playing lousy football the past couple weeks.

Detroit News and Detroit Free Press stories :

Next up for the Lions, the Thanksgiving day game against 9-1 Green Bay. If the Lions don't make some changes offensively, it could be an embarrassing day for Detroit. The Packers have scored over 30 points in each of the last three games, so the Lions offense will need to keep up. It would be an impressive defensive performance if Detroit holds Green Bay to less than 20 points.

Week Twelve

Thanksgiving game in Detroit won by Green Bay 37-26.

The Lions waited until they were out of the game to start playing football in the 4th quarter.

Detroit Free Press photos

Box Score

1234Total
Green Bay01714637
Detroit6331426

Recap

Brett Favre sported a white T-shirt, carpenter's pants and a scruffy beard. Favre set a Green Bay record with 20 consecutive completions and finished with a season-high 381 yards and three touchdowns. "I threw it. They caught it," he said simply. "Nothing spectacular."

The three-time MVP put together another sensational performance that made the 38-year-old quarterback look as if he's back in his prime. Favre's seventh 300-yard game of the season matched a team mark he set in 1995.

Green Bay (10-1) matched its best 11-game record since 1929 and the NFC North leaders took a four-game lead with five games left in the regular season. The Packers can improve their chances of earning home-field advantage if they win next week at Dallas -- also 10-1.

Detroit (6-5) lost its third straight game, making its playoff picture bleak because it would lose wild-card tiebreakers against the New York Giants, Washington, Philadelphia and Arizona. "We aren't where we want to be, but we are where we need to be," Kitna said. "We have to get to 10. Ten gets you in."

The 6-5 Lions play next at 5-6 Minnesota. The Lions beat the Vikings in week two 20-17 in overtime. UT's Chester Taylor has played well in the past two Vikings games for the injured rooky Adrian Peterson who is expected to play against Detroit.

Nov 26, 2007 story :

As long as everything goes as planned this week in practice, Childress said he would ease Peterson back against the Lions, splitting carries with veteran Chester Taylor.

Despite missing the past two games, Peterson still leads the NFL with 1,081 yards rushing and is second to Philadelphia's Brian Westbrook with 1,301 yards from scrimmage.

The Vikings (5-6) have won three of their last four games to creep back into the playoff picture in the muddled NFC. Detroit (6-5) has lost three in a row after starting the season 6-2.

Taylor's stats for the last two games :

The Lions are now 1-3 since Kitna wore his Halloween costume. The Lions have also played better teams recently, and their schedule for the remainder of the season will prove whether the Lions are a playoff team. Final five games :

The records of the six teams the Lions have defeated:

Week Thirteen

Minnesota 42, Detroit 10. The Vikings scored 28 points in the second quarter and led 35-10 at the half. A pummeling. The Vikings are trending upward as the end of the season nears while Detroit is going down in flames as the Lions lose its fourth consecutive game.

Goes to show, you can't start talking playoffs at the halfway point of the season. The Kitna Halloween costume jinx continues. The Lions are now 1-4 after the alleged leader of the Lions offense dressed up like an idiot. The Lions may only win one more game. But at seven victories, that will still be the best the Lions will have done in several years.

Detroit Free Press photos

Box Score

1234Total
Detroit370010
Minnesota7287042