The NFL regular season wrapped up this past weekend, and now all that’s left is to wait for the highly anticipated playoff matchups. The Detroit Lions finished atop the NFC, earning Dan Campbell‘s squad the privilege of enjoying a Bye Week.
How is the coach preparing during these days leading up to his debut in this new stage of the season? Intense training sessions, followed by a weekend of rest while the rest of their rivals will be battling it out to stay in the race.
“We’re going to bring them in Thursday, we’re going to go good-on-good, practice. Most of it will be situations, end of half, end of game, we’ll come back Friday and do a full-game, all-out, three hours, full hitting, goal line, short-yardage,” Campbell explained to the press. “Thursday, we’ll practice, it won’t be in pads, but it will be end-of-game situations, probably an hour just to stay in flow and little things that we need, little detail work that we can get. And, that’s for the guys that we know can go out there and move and work.
“And then after that, giving them three days off, and then they’ll be back in Monday. And by then, hopefully we know the opponent, and we’ll be ready to go,” Dan Campbell added.
Jahmyr Gibbs #26 of the Detroit Lions celebrates a touchdown with Amon-Ra St. Brown #14 during the first quarter against the Minnesota Vikings at Ford Field on January 05, 2025 in Detroit, Michigan.
“I’m going to get a little bit of work over the next two days. Like I said, we’ll practice, and then I plan on getting out of here a little bit. I’ll have stuff with me, and there will be some little things that I’m working on. Things I know that I can do better, get better at, things that I want to look at, do my own checklist as it pertains to us like over the last, call it five weeks, six weeks. But, other than that, I want to spend time with my family and just sit back for a minute and just charge back up and be ready to go,” he finally concluded.
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The importance of Anzalone for Campbell
One of the standout highlights in the Lions‘ latest performance was undoubtedly the return of Alex Anzalone to the field, a player who was previously believed to possibly miss the game against the Vikings.
According to Campbell’s own words, the linebacker could have the same impact on the defense as Jared Goff does on the offense, to the point where he’s been referred to as the ‘QB of the defense.
“It was huge. Look, I’ve said it before, he’s really our quarterback on defense. He’s our quarterback on defense, and you know, he just brings, there’s a lot of confidence he brings, a lot of energy. He can calm the storms, he just, to have him back, you know, and I thought it was going to take him a minute to work himself back in. And it didn’t take long at all. He was back to what he was before he got injured I thought, so I mean, he’ll get a game ball. It was outstanding. So to have him back was, it was huge.”
