Vikings’ Historic Comeback Over Colts Still Defies Belief Four Years Later

When the Colts and Vikings meet at Minneapolis’s U.S. Bank Stadium this weekend for their Week 7 matchup, it will remind everyone of one of the most improbable games the league has ever seen. Nearly four years ago—Saturday, Dec. 17, 2022, to be exact—the Vikings defied the odds. After falling behind 33–0 at halftime, Minnesota rallied behind a heroic effort from quarterback Kirk Cousins and running back Dalvin Cook to stun the Colts, 39–36, in overtime and complete the largest comeback in NFL history—a record that still stands.

Since then, both franchises have gone in different directions at quarterback and, most recently, in the front office, with the Colts parting ways with general manager Chris Ballard earlier this week. Still, the two teams will forever be linked by their improbable 2022 meeting. 

Before we get to their Week 7 matchup, let’s take a look back at how the largest comeback in NFL history unfolded.

The Vikings entered Week 15 of the 2022 season with a 10–3 record, but they were also coming off a 34–23 loss to the division-rival Lions the previous Sunday. Despite the defeat, Cousins had put together a then-season-high 425-yard passing performance and looked to be finding his footing within new head coach Kevin O’Connell’s West Coast–adjacent offense. While the system was familiar to Cousins, who had previously played in a similar scheme under Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay in Washington, Cousins entered the 2022 season having worked with four different offensive coordinators over four years. Finally, he appeared to have some consistency under an offensive-minded head coach.

As play-by-play color commentator Noah Eagle stated at kickoff, the Vikings were “looking to reestablish themself for the final stretch run [of the] season.”

Conversely, the Colts were in the midst of a tumultuous 2022 campaign. After a 3-5-1 start, the team fired head coach Frank Reich and, instead of promoting someone in-house to weather the storm for the remainder of the season, owner Jim Irsay handed the keys to Jeff Saturday in the interim. A franchise legend who spent over a decade at the center of Peyton Manning’s offensive line, Saturday’s only prior coaching experience had been at Hebron Christian High School (Dacula, Ga.). He became the first NFL head coach with no prior college or professional experience since, ironically, Norm Van Brocklin with the Vikings in 1961. While the Colts used the interim-coach bump to beat the Raiders in Saturday’s debut, they entered Week 15 against the Vikings on a three-game losing streak—and fresh off a 54–19 shellacking at the hands of the Cowboys.  

It’s part of what made their 33–0 lead after two quarters so jarring. 

The Colts dominated the game from the jump. After Dallis Flowers returned the opening kickoff 49 yards, just shy of midfield, quarterback Matt Ryan led the Indianapolis offense on an 11-play drive that resulted in a Chase McLaughlin field goal. After forcing Cousins and the Vikings into a quick three-and-out, the Colts blocked Ryan Wright’s punt, and linebacker JoJo Domann returned it for a touchdown. 

Minnesota looked poised to respond after Cook ripped off a 40-yard run into Colts territory on the following possession. One play later, however, Cook fumbled, and cornerback Isaiah Rodgers Sr. recovered it, giving Indianapolis the ball back.

Seven plays, 66 yards and a one-yard touchdown from Deon Jackson later, the Colts led 17–0 with just under four minutes still to go in the first quarter.

And it only got worse in the second frame. 

Indianapolis added two more field goals from McLaughlin on back-to-back possessions, pushing its lead to 23–0. Then, on Minnesota’s third drive of the quarter, Cousins threw a back-breaking pick-six to safety Julian Blackmon, putting his team into a 30–0 hole—one they seemed unlikely to climb out of. McLaughlin would put one more kick through the uprights just before halftime, sending the Vikings into the locker room trailing 33–0. For context, teams that trailed by 30 points at halftime were 1-1,548-1 since 1930 heading into this one. Not exactly an inspiring stat for Minnesota.

“The state of the Vikings at this moment is not particularly good,” said Tom Pelissero, who was reporting from Minnesota’s sideline, at halftime. “This is a team that Kevin O’Connell, one week ago, had talked to about [having] the opportunity to clinch the division with a win. That didn’t happen. This week, O’Connell said his only point to the team was that [they] need to take a microscopic look at everything we do. O’Connell also told us it’s been good to coach through adversity. Well, down 33–0, that’s a whole lot of it.” 

Whatever O’Connell told his Vikings team at halftime, it worked. After going three-and-out on its first possession, Minnesota’s offense found its groove on the following drive. A 13-yard pass from Cousins to star wide receiver Justin Jefferson and a 63-yard catch-and-run by K.J. Osborn set up the Vikings’  first trip into Colts’ territory all game, and they capitalized with a touchdown, cutting Indianapolis’s lead to 26.

The Colts answered with a field goal, and the game quickly became all Vikings from here on out.

Fullback C.J. Hamm capped an eight-play, 75-yard drive on a one-yard touchdown run that brought the Vikings within three possessions, with the score 36–14 entering the fourth quarter. That’s when Minnesota’s defense turned it on, forcing the Colts to punt on three consecutive possessions. 

Capitalizing on the stops, Cousins marched the Vikings downfield for two more scores—one an eight-yard touchdown pass to Jefferson, the other a one-yard strike to Adam Thielen—and even with an interception sandwiched in between, Minnesota was suddenly down only eight points. 

The defining moment, though, came with 2:15 left on the clock. 

Even after stopping the Colts on fourth-and-1, Next Gen Stats gave the Vikings only a 12.6% chance to win as they trailed 36–28 and began the ensuing drive on their 36-yard line. Facing first-and-10, Cousins dropped back and dumped a short pass to Cook, who had a screen set up for him as he lined up as the outside receiver. What the running back did next was nothing short of phenomenal. After juking safety Rodney Thomas, Cook accelerated through the Colts’ defense, broke a last-ditch tackle attempt by Rodgers, and found his way into the end zone for a 64-yard score.

A successful two-point conversion to tight end T.J. Hockenson then tied the game at 36, effectively completing the comeback and sending U.S. Bank Stadium into a frenzy.

From there, it was onto overtime.

After both teams traded eight-play drives that went nowhere, the Vikings closed it out. Cousins engineered an eight-play, 60-yard drive—highlighted by a 21-yard gain to Thielen that put the offense inside field-goal range—to set up kicker Greg Joseph for a 40-yard attempt. The veteran kicker nailed it with just three seconds remaining in the extra frame, clinching the NFC North title for the Vikings in miraculous fashion while putting a bow on the largest comeback in NFL history.

Cousins finished the day with a new-season-high 460 passing yards and four touchdown passes, Cook totaled 190 yards and the game-tying score, and Osborn logged a career-best 157 receiving yards. The Vikings would close the 2022 regular season 13–4 before losing to the Giants in the NFC wild-card round.

As for the Colts, this would be Ryan’s final NFL game—he was benched for the remainder of the year and retired the following month—while the franchise moved on from Saturday's season-ending loss and hired Shane Steichen as its next head coach.

Now, as the two sides prepare to face off this weekend, their historic matchup from four years ago serves as a warning: No lead in the NFL is ever safe.