PRO FOOTBALL ’95 : Vikings Shut Down Sanders in 20-10 Victory

No gaps, no holes, no daylight. Merely a wall of purple.

That’s what Barry Sanders usually sees at the Metrodome, and that’s all he saw Sunday.

While Fuad Reveiz kicked two field goals to set an NFL record with 30 in a row, the Minnesota Vikings’ defense turned in a near-flawless performance against Sanders in a 20-10 victory over the Detroit Lions.

Sanders, voted the offensive player of the year last season, gained only 35 yards in 13 carries, and that included a 12-yard run on the second-to-last play of the game. It was his worst regular-season game since the Lions (0-2) visited Minnesota in the second game last season, when Sanders ran 12 times for 16 yards.

“It seems like all anyone wants to talk about when we play Detroit is how good Barry Sanders is going to do,” Viking defensive end Roy Barker said. “He’s a great back, don’t get me wrong. But if you get eight or nine guys upfield and cut off his options, he has no place to go.”

While the Vikings were shutting down Detroit’s running game, they won with a conservative offense led by Robert Smith, who gained 111 yards in 20 carries in only the second time he rushed for more than 100 yards in a game. The other time also was against Detroit, when he gained 115 in 1993.

Reveiz entered the season needing to make his first field goal attempt to tie San Diego’s John Carney for the NFL record of 29 consecutive. He did that with a 32-yarder before halftime.

Detroit had one scoring drive, when Scott Mitchell’s 47-yard pass to Herman Moore tied the score, 7-7, in the first quarter. The Lions’ only other points came on a 33-yard Jason Hanson field goal in the second quarter.

“Any time you take Barry Sanders out of the game it makes our offense very difficult to run,” Detroit Coach Wayne Fontes said. “Their defensive line outplayed our offensive line, that’s what it came down to.”

The Vikings scored their final touchdown with 4:40 remaining in the game when Warren Moon and Qadry Ismail teamed for an 85-yard touchdown pass.