Redskins Recap: Defensive effort comes too late in loss

The Washington Redskins were unable to beat the Minnesota Vikings due to their defensive performance. They now fall to 4-5.

A week after the Redskins defense played one of their best games in decades, the team was unable to take care of business at home against the Vikings. Despite a strong offensive performance, the team lost 38-30 as their defense sputtered en route to their fifth loss.

The defense simply didn’t do well enough throughout the game to win this one. Throughout the first three quarters, Case Keenum moved the ball at will during that time, and he led the Vikings on five touchdown drives in the first six drives of the game. He looked unstoppable, which isn’t good news for the Redskins. Keenum is one of the top backups in the game, but he shouldn’t have had so much success against the team.

In particular, Josh Norman and Bashaud Breeland had rough days. Both Stefon Diggs and Adam Thielen were able to completely dominate the Redskins defensive backs. Neither was able to slow either receiver down despite the fact that Diggs was still recovering from and injury and Thielen is nothing more than a strong athlete. Norman and Breeland were simply beaten too many times, and they need to fix that moving forward.

On the bright side, the Redskins did get a nice defensive performance out of D.J. Swearinger. The safety, in his first year with the Redskins, was all over the field and did all he could to spark a comeback. He had two interceptions on Keenum and made a huge tackle for loss to nearly take the Vikings out of field goal range. If Swearinger keeps making big plays, then the Redskins defense will be in better shape.

Things were better on the offensive side of the ball for Washington. Kirk Cousins had a strong performance and generally did well against the Vikings. He had good ball placement on a lot of his throws and he did well to move the ball on the ground near the goal line. However, Cousins did have one critical interception at the end of the second half that really allowed the Vikings to start pulling away. Minnesota converted the pick into seven points and that allowed them to take a big halftime lead.

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Elsewhere on offense, Rob Kelley was lost to an ankle injury so Chris Thompson and Samaje Perine had to carry the load. Perine looked good in limited action, but because of the comeback bid, Thompson saw a lot more time given his pass catching prowess. The duo looks like they could be successful in the event that Kelley has to miss time.

For the receivers, Jamison Crowder and Vernon Davis led the way. The two were good at working the middle of the field, an area that Cousins likes throwing to. It’s possible that they could be Cousins’ top targets in the coming weeks, and Davis may soon overtake the injury prone Jordan Reed on the Redskins depth chart.

A final note about the game: Nick Rose, the rookie kicker, hit a 56-yard field goal in a clutch situation. He has looked good kicking field goals this year, and if he continues to be accurate, he could push Dustin Hopkins for his job.

Next: Redskins halftime takeaways from Week 10

Overall, this was a disheartening loss for the Redskins. They could have won this game if they played better defense. But they didn’t show up on that side until it was too late.

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