Dan Campbell Defends Decision to Keep Starters in for 49ers Game

Dan Campbell and the Lions aren’t taking their foot off the gas.

Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell reacts to a play against San Francisco 49ers. / Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Detroit Lions kept rolling on Monday night, winning a shootout against the San Francisco 49ers, 40-34.

While the game served as a bit of revenge after the Lions’ loss to the Niners in last season's NFC Championship Game, it was unclear heading into the game whether or not Detroit would play its starters. Or rather, it would have been unclear if the team's coach was anyone other than Dan Campbell.

After the Vikings beat the Packers on Sunday, the No. 1 seed was set to come down to next week’s game between the Minnesota Vikings and Detroit, regardless of what happened in San Francisco on Monday night. When the question of sitting starters was raised earlier in the week, Campbell made it clear that he was letting his top guys play.

At the podium after Monday night's win, Campbell explained his reasoning a bit further.

“I thought a lot about it. I thought about it leading up to the game. I thought about it last night,” Campbell said. “But I ended up settling on the right thing to do was to play these guys because we owed it to the team.”

Campbell said his decision came down to fairness, stressing the importance of getting practice reps heading into a game.

“I just don’t believe it’s fair to put in a guy who’s not prepared to play, especially a young player,” Campbell said. “And then, you can only sit six guys, so who are those six? And then the other guys that don’t, is it fair to them that we’re not using everything we’ve got?

“We flew out here, we prepared this way, we came out to win. And yeah, you cross your fingers nobody gets hurt. It’s tough. And we were fortunate. We got out, and now it’s on to the next one.”

There was one more aspect to letting his starters play, though this one was based more on emotion than logic.

“This is what we do,” Campbell told reporters. “We love it hard.”

That attitude has made Campbell beloved in Detroit, and those same vibes have carried the Lions to a 14-2 record with one game to play.

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