Make-Or-Break For Ravens at Minnesota

NFL News - October 12th, 2009 - Written by Scott

For three weeks, it appeared the Baltimore Ravens defense had peeled back the pages of history and returned to the glory days. The unit had only allowed four touchdowns to the Chiefs, Chargers and Browns to start 3-0.

Ray Lewis even gave it a signature moment when he mauled San Diego's helpless Darren Sproles in the backfield on 4th-and-2 with less than a minute to go to preserve the game. Since then, however, it has done everything it could to shoot itself in the foot and the Ravens are now behind the 8-ball, trailing Pittsburgh and Cincinnati in the AFC North.

They can make a big statement this week when they face the unbeaten Minnesota Vikings at the Metrodome. No team has been able to slow down Brett Favre and Adrian Peterson through five games. The pair has accounted for 1550 of the team's 1663 yards this season and 16 of their 19 touchdowns. The only other players on the team with a score is Chester Taylor and defensive end Jared Allen.

The Ravens are not favored in this game, and probably won't be for the next several weeks when they play Denver, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Pittsburgh twice, Green Bay and Chicago over their next nine games. BetUS is marking Baltimore as three-point underdogs with a payout of -115. Taking the Vikings nets a possible return of -105.

Allen has been playing out of his mind as of late, with 4.5 sacks, two fumble recoveries, a pass deflecting and the aforementioned touchdown in his last two games. He is the key reason the Vikings are ninth in scoring defense and allow opponents to convert third downs only 32-percent of the time. That defense may just be meeting up with the Ravens at just the right time.

The purple and black started the season with over 1,500 yards in their first three games, and quarterback Joe Flacco set a career record with 342 passing yards against the Browns. Since then, he has only regressed, going for 246 the next week against New England and then 186 against Cincinnati in Week Four.

The Ravens have won eight of their last 12 games ATS as underdogs. They have only met the Vikings once since 2002. They won their 2005 match-up, 30-23, which knocked the Vikings out of the playoff race on Christmas Day.

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