Mitch Albom: Detroit Lions no longer a cute story. They're now a win away from Super Bowl

Rookie running back Jahmyr Gibbs took the football on Tampa Bay’s 31-yard line and burst out like a cannon shot, a piece of Detroit’s future trying desperately to outrun its past. He shot through the line, then deftly cut left, and it was a foot race to the end zone, with only safety Antoine Winfield Jr. chasing. Gibbs surged. The crowd leapt to its feet. And as the young Lion straight-armed his defender, crossed the pylon, and saw the referee throw two hands in the air, finally, finally, youth and freshness and something really new saw its day in the Detroit sun.

The Detroit Lions had a fourth-quarter lead they would not relinquish. And when linebacker Derrick Barnes made a jumping interception to squash Tampa Bay’s final gasp, Detroit, for the second playoff game in a row, got to run out the clock by taking a knee. Fireworks exploded. Blue and white streamers fell from the rafters. And the message was clear: last week was no fluke. It’s a new era of expectations, and a whole new ball game around here.

Read it and leap. In the last week in January, the Lions are one of four NFL teams still standing, and the whole new ball game is next Sunday in San Francisco, where Detroit will play to capture the NFC and go to the Super Bowl.

I’ll give you a moment to get off the floor.

“We delivered body blows,” a weary coach Dan Campbell said when this combat was over. “We did what we had to do to win that game. …

“I’m exhausted. and I didn’t even play.”

Can you blame him? In a contest that saw two offenses slugging until their last breaths, two defenses selling out on blitzes, and two once-discarded quarterbacks throwing 84 times between them for nearly 600 yards and five touchdowns, the Lions outlasted the surprisingly tenacious Bucs, 31-23, won their 14th game of the season, and shook the very studs of Ford Field with thunderous love from the sellout crowd, which exploded at every turnaround moment.

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“It’s awesome, it really is cool,” said Goff, the Lions’ now-beloved quarterback who once again heard his name chanted endlessly as a stadium mantra. (“JA-RED GOFF! JAR-ED GOFF!’)

“I said (last week) it was something I’ll probably never experience again — and I experienced it again.”

'It's hard to describe'

Actually, that sums it up beautifully. As great as it felt the previous Sunday beating former Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford and the Rams, this game was something bigger, something broader and more defining. It wasn’t about proving that the Lions could defeat their past. It was about proving they have a future.

They do. This hungry, tightly-motivated group has now won back-to-back playoff games, something Detroit hasn’t done since 1957. And it heads to San Francisco as a point-spread underdog, but hardly a surprise. Dallas was upset. Philly collapsed. Even the 49ers almost blew their divisional game against Green Bay.

Detroit sails on.

“It’s incredible,” said center Frank Ragnow, the six-year veteran who battled a leg injury to stay in the game and embody the sandpaper grit that Campbell has cultivated with this team. “You just reflect on … the frustrating seasons where I’m home by now already for two weeks. To be here today, when we're in victory formation and looking at the crowd — it’s hard to describe.”

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It is. But we’ll try.

So many contributors to historic run

Here were the snapshot moments that lingered long after the stadium emptied and Detroit partiers reveled into the cold Sunday evening.

Here was Amon-Ra St. Brown, snagging eight passes, pulling two defenders with him for a first down, and running under a perfect Goff lob to the end zone for a 9-yard touchdown that iced the game.

Here was Gibbs, just 21 years old, running and receiving for 114 yards of offense, and the touchdown that pushed them in front for good.

Here was Aidan Hutchinson, doing what he does best, mauling quarterback Baker Mayfield on a crucial third-down sack that pushed the Bucs out of field goal range and began the second-half tilt that delivered this game to the home team.

Here was tight end Sam LaPorta, still gimpy from his knee injury, catching nine passes and giving Goff the safety valve he needed to move the chains.

Here was safety C.J. Gardner Johnson, seeing a Mayfield pass ricochet off the hands of receiver Mike Evans and hang up there long enough for C.J. to coo, “Come to Papa.”

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The ball landed in his waiting hands and he scampered 12 yards before exiting on the Bucs sideline, where he tossed the ball to Mayfield as he passed him, drawing a glare from the 28-year-old quarterback. Remember these two had a media moment earlier in the week, when Gardner-Johnson suggested the Bucs had a talented receiving corps but needed a better quarterback. At the time of his interception, it seemed like C.J. and the Lions might be laughing all day.

But never poke a bear. Mayfield, the quirky, often dismissed QB, came back more determined than ever, and almost stole this game from the Lions with brazen throws in the shadow of rushers and an uncanny use of short passes underneath the Lions’ D.

Mayfield would throw for three touchdowns and 319 yards. But his final toss was a high bullet over the middle …

And here came Barnes, leaping for a killer interception that lit the Lions’ sideline on fire and sent Ford Field into delirium.

“What a huge play,” Campbell later marveled. Barnes is emblematic of this team. A fourth-round draft pick who came along slowly, needed cultivating and patience, all of which has paid off this season, and never more than on that play, which iced the game with just over 90 seconds left.

“I just jumped it, man,” Barnes gushed to NBC moments after the game ended.

Read it and leap.

'We're not here by accident'

A word here about Goff, who seems to grow calmer the louder everything gets. He was once again mostly precision, completing 30 of 43 passes and never throwing a pick. You get the feeling the win over the Rams was a huge relief for the California kid, and he has now come nearly full circle in his career, believing he can again lead a team to the promised land and inching closer to it every week.

“We’re not here by accident,” he said after this was over. “… I don’t want to say this arrogantly, but we expected to win the first game, we expected to win this game, and now we get to go to a game we expected to be in.”

How fresh is that? Think about how fast this has happened. Sunday was the three-year anniversary of Campbell’s hiring as coach. Everyone remembers his opening news conference, and his “bite their kneecaps” comments. Back then, it was a laugh. Now, it’s part of the handbook.

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Yet Campbell, who has proved to be a superb coach and motivator, should not be measured by quotes, but by progress, so consider this:

Two seasons ago, the Lions were five wins shy of a .500 record.

Last season, they were one win shy of the playoffs.

Today, they are one win shy of the Super Bowl.

Someone asked Campbell if he ever envisioned this when he took the car keys three years ago.

“I envisioned,” he said, thinking it over, “that we would have the chance to compete with the big boys.”

They do now. San Francisco is the reigning king of the NFC, and a team that just missed the Super Bowl last year. The Lions will have their arms full out west, and they won’t have the Ford Field army behind them.

But don’t count them out. The last time Detroit reached the NFC championship game, Erik Kramer was the quarterback, Barry Sanders the running back, Lomas Brown was on the line, and Jim Arnold was the crazy punter. It was a team that had missed the playoffs the year before, then suddenly elevated to 12 wins and a division crown. And maybe that sounds familiar.

But that team only had to win one playoff game, a blow-out over the Cowboys, and almost too soon found itself going for the brass ring against Washington, who knocked the Lions on their butts, 41-10.

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This team feels different. It takes each week in stride. It has swagger, but not to exceed its talent. It has youth and it has experience. It has coaches who are lasered in. It has gritty guys like Ragnow who will keep playing if they lose an appendage.

And it has a lot of ways to attack you, be it a sacking Hutchinson, a flying St. Brown, a steady Goff, an explosive Gibbs, a tenacious LaPorta, or a hero-of-the-week like Barnes, jumping to pull a win out of the suddenly rarefied air.

Read it and leap: Detroit is one win from the Super Bowl. They say miracles only happen when pigs can fly. But who knows? The way this is going, maybe Lions can fly, too.

Contact Mitch Albom: malbom@freepress.com. Check out the latest updates with his charities, books and events at MitchAlbom.com. Follow him @mitchalbom.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Lions no feel-good story, they're a win away from Super Bowl