Matthew Coller: Can the Vikings emulate the 2021 Rams?

Kevin O'Connell is using his experience winning the Super Bowl as an example.

Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford (9) gestures downfield in the second quarter during Super Bowl 56 against the Cincinnati Bengals, Sunday, Feb. 13, 2022, at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif. The Cincinnati Bengals lost, 23-20. Nfl Super Bowl 56 Los Angeles Rams Vs Cincinnati Bengals Feb 13 2022 1393 / Kareem Elgazzar/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK

EAGAN — In 2021, the Los Angeles Rams made a number of big moves to build a roster full of veteran stars, including trading for quarterback Matthew Stafford and bringing in Odell Beckham Jr. and Von Miller. The discussion surrounding that team was that they were all-in for that season and anything short of a Super Bowl would make all of their trades involving draft picks and big contracts in vein.

The Rams started off that year looking like the team they were expected to be with Stafford under center, going 7-1 through the end of October. But they hit some rough waters in the middle of the year with three straight losses and several subsequent wins (including one of the Vikings) that were near escapes rather than decisive victories.

On the last day of the season, they lost in overtime to their rival 49ers and only gained 265 yards on offense. The loss earned the Rams a ticket to the Wild Card round and then they had to go on the road against Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the Divisional Round.

After a crazy Brady comeback late in the game, Stafford hit a deep shot against a Todd Bowles blitz and took the Rams to the NFC Championship. There the 49ers controlled most of the game but a dropped interception in the fourth quarter gave Stafford new life and NFL legend Aaron Donald took over the game, earning the Rams a trip to the Super Bowl.

In the same fashion as the previous two playoff games, the Super Bowl came down to one drive in which Stafford whipped a no-look pass to Cooper Kupp that set up the game-winning score.

While the Rams were a 12-win team in the regular season, their run to the Super Bowl was improbable considering they were the No. 4 seed. In the previous decade there had only been a handful of instances of teams making the Super Bowl from the No. 4 seed or lower, including the 2010 Packers, 2011 Giants, 2012 Ravens and 2020 Bucs.

The offensive coordinator for that Rams team was Minnesota Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell.

Following the Vikings loss to the Detroit Lions last Sunday, which moved the Vikings from the No. 1 seed if they had won to the No. 5 seed despite going 14-3 during the regular season, O’Connell evoked the journey that the 2021 Rams went on through four weeks of playoffs to the top of the sport.

“I was a part of a team in 2021 where we lost our last game and found a way to do what we needed to do to have a chance to play for a world championship,” O’Connell said. “So, regardless of your path that either team will go on, both of these teams are guaranteed 60 [more] minutes and ours happens to be next Monday night. We’re going to get ready to play a football game and hopefully get back to doing a lot of the things that we’ve done pretty consistently all season long as a team.”

Offensive coordinator Wes Phillips, who was also on the 2021 Rams staff, talked on Tuesday about a detail of the 2021 run that might be relevant to the Vikings: The fact that the Rams had to beat the 49ers, a team that had owned them in the previous matchups.

“If we did end up seeing Detroit again at some point, we had to beat San Francisco [in 2021], who had beat us twice that year, and really, in my tenure there, had beat us six straight times,” Phillips said. “We really didn't have the right formula, the right answer, and we're able to kind of put together a good plan for the NFC championship game and able to get that win.”

So how similar are the 2021 Rams and the 2024 Vikings?

Statistically speaking, there are a lot of parallels.

— The Vikings have a +100 point differential. The 2021 Rams were +88

— The Rams had 19 INTs and 50 sacks, the Vikings have 24 INTs and 49 sacks

— The Rams gave up the 6th fewest yards rushing, Vikings 2nd fewest

— L.A. was 25th in rushing yards, the Vikings are 19th

— The Rams had the league leader in receiving yards, the Vikings have the No. 2 receiver

— Entering the playoffs the Rams had the ninth best Super Bowl odds in 2021, the Vikings are 6th.

— Matthew Stafford’s QB rating was 102.9. Sam Darnold’s is 102.5

If we dive even deeper into the Stafford/Darnold comparison, Stafford was 6th in Big-Time Throw Percentage and 9th in Turnover-Worthy Play Percentage and Darnold is 6th and 3rd, respectively.

Stafford was 5th in Average Depth of Target, Darnold is 3rd.

Stafford was 2nd in yards per attempt under pressure, Darnold is 3rd.

The biggest similarity might be that both the 2021 Rams and 2024 Vikings swing for the fences on offense and defense. They hit on explosive pass plays and caused turnovers and sacks on defense, which made up for other shortcomings like the Rams coverage unit, which only ranked 12th by PFF in 2021. The Vikings’ coverage ranks 16th.

Both teams were also constructed by foundational elite players that they drafted and a lot of outside free agents or trade acquisitions. The Rams had drafted Donald and Cooper Kupp and then added along the way Andrew Whitworth, Von Miller, Leonard Floyd, Jalen Ramsey. The Vikings drafted Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison and Brian O’Neill and then added TJ Hockenson, Jonathan Greenard, Andrew Van Ginkel and Blake Cashman.

Neither team was/is young. The Vikings rank 32nd in snaps by players on rookie contracts this year. The Rams only player on offense under 24 was Cam Akers. Addison and LB Ivan Pace Jr. are the only under-25 starters for the Vikings.

Since there are a good amount of parallels, how did the Rams do it?

At the top of the list: Some stuff went their way and their best players came through.

“I've always felt like the teams that make it to the Super Bowl, the ball's just — it's got to bounce the right way a couple of times,” Phillips said. “Your best players got to play great at the big moments in the game. And you kind of see that throughout the league. I felt that way when my dad was part of a Super Bowl team. It just felt like… their best players made plays in the big moments that they needed them..”

O’Connell recalled the 2021 Rams using their failure in the final game of the season to refocus and then building off their opening-round decisive victory over Arizona.

“I remember we didn't get the result we wanted in that last game and we were able to do what we're attempting to do this week from a standpoint of acknowledging how it happened, acknowledging how we need to improve,” O’Connell said. “The late season improvement, sometimes, is just about consistency. It's about doing some of the things that you think back over the season we did really well, we got to make sure we find a way to do a lot of those things in a single elimination tournament to give yourself the best chance to win a game. Then it's about momentum from there.”

Of course, the Vikings can’t recreate the Rams’ magical run unless they beat the Rams on Monday. If they do that, things could get interesting. A potential date with the Lions seems to loom but there are other permutations that could either land the Vikings a home game or match them up with another team that they haven’t faced yet this season. And then they would need to have things go their way, which O’Connell admits is a major part of going deep in the postseason.

“There's 1,000 little things that go on in the game,” he said. “I've told you guys before, I can think back to seven to 10 plays throughout the course of that run, where if one of those go differently, who knows.”