Souhan: Circumstances insist Vikings will have their usual not-a-bit-normal playoff experience

The Vikings have yet to take a postseason snap in 2025, yet this season’s playoff experience is already redolent of the franchise’s odd and frustrating history.

The team that gave you the Original Whizzinator, mutilated stuffed animals, a collapsed dome and a million heartbreaks enters the playoffs with an altered travel schedule, the first and perhaps last step on a path that could lead to the greatest triumph in franchise history or a reminder of failures past.

When the Metrodome collapsed in 2010, the Vikings moved a home game to Detroit and played the New York Giants in an almost-empty Ford Field. State Farm Stadium is expected to be full Monday, so the Giants game that will prove instructive is the one that happened two years ago.

The Vikings’ surprising 13-win team of 2022 lost a home playoff game in January 2023 to the Giants, who have since been revealed as incompetent. Because of that loss, Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell is in danger, just three seasons in, of becoming the quintessential Vikings head coach.

He has the best winning percentage in franchise history yet could fall to 0-2 in the postseason.

The Vikings haven’t won a playoff game since the 2019 season. They haven’t played in a Super Bowl since the 1976 season. Rumor has it they have never won a Super Bowl.

O’Connell was hired in part because his mentor, Rams coach Sean McVay, proved when they worked together that a franchise need not require patience or be constrained by its own history in a pursuit of a title.

McVay coached in a Super Bowl in his second season, and won one in his fifth, with O’Connell as his offensive coordinator.

O’Connell still had confetti in his hair when he joined the Vikings, and he quickly became the first coach in franchise history to produce two 13-win seasons.

What we’ll learn Monday night is whether this year’s team is better prepared to win a playoff game than the 2022 team.

It should be.

The 2022 team mastered the art of the close victory over questionable competition. The 2024 team should be better.

The 2022 defense was run by Ed Donatell, who tried to obscure personnel weaknesses with a passive scheme that counted on opposing offenses making mistakes. By the time the playoffs arrived, it was an open secret that Donatell would be fired if the Vikings didn’t make a playoff run. They didn’t, and he was.

The 2024 defense is run by Brian Flores, who should be a head coach, and might be soon, and who emphasizes aggression and unpredictability.

Flores is one reason why a playoff loss this time around could precipitate widespread change.

If he left, the Vikings would be revamping their defensive scheme, and would be missing one of the driving forces of the many shrewd acquisitions that made this defense special.

Top cornerback Stephon Gilmore is playing on a one-year contract, as is third corner Shaq Griffin. Safety Harrison Smith might retire, and cornerback Byron Murphy Jr. and safety Cam Bynum are playing in the last year of their deals. Theoretically, all could depart, although the Vikings are more likely to find a way to keep two or three.

Which brings us to the man of the hour, or three.

Sam Darnold could become the most unlikely hero in franchise history, could earn a large contract from the Vikings, or he could again enter the open market with regret.

His career turnaround was orchestrated by O’Connell, but O’Connell couldn’t assuage his nerves last week.

Because of poor throws and missed reads, Darnold failed to produce four sure-thing touchdowns in Week 18 at Detroit. He was the difference between the Vikings taking a large first-half lead and chasing 40 points, and failing to get to double digits.

If Darnold implodes in a second straight first half, I wouldn’t be surprised to see them inserting Daniel Jones, or using Jones as their bridge quarterback next year while they prepare J.J. McCarthy to become the starter.

A 14-win season is rare, and this one will mean nothing if Darnold follows one implosion with a postseason failure.