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Spunky Arizona runs out of steam Cardinals' season of emergence crushed by Vikings
Posted: Sunday January 10, 1999 10:05 PM
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- So much for the Cardiac Cardinals, at least for now. After their 41-21 demolition at the hands of the Minnesota Vikings in an NFC playoff game Sunday at the Metrodome, a more appropriate moniker would be Crushed Cardinals. Steamrolled on the field and subdued in the locker room. They took no solace in their successful season and weren't about to fall into the just-happy-to-be-here mode. "If you ask me if it feels good to be here, it doesn't,' linebacker Jamir Miller said. "It never feels good to lose. "Maybe two or three weeks down the road, when I reflect, maybe I'll feel a little better about it," he added. "But you know, I just got trounced, so I can't feel good about it." Second-year quarterback Jake Plummer, who was done in by noise and nerves, had three turnovers. He said the 20-point pummeling made it hard to relish the strides the Cards made in 1998, their first winning season since moving to Phoenix a decade ago. "Tonight's going to hurt," Plummer said. "We should be mad for a while. We had a great opportunity. We didn't take advantage of it. "But a month from now, when I'm out teeing off, I can look back and say, `Wow. We did have a pretty good year. We put together a good season.'" The Cardinals, who set an NFL record by going 7-1 in games decided by a field goal or less this season, never gave themselves a chance at another miracle finish, surrendering points on seven of the Vikings' first nine possessions and failing to force a punt until the fourth quarter. But Cardinals coach Vince Tobin said the sting of defeat can't erase the strides the franchise made this season. The spunky Cardinals (10-8) had to win their final three games of the regular season to make the playoffs, and they won all three on last-second field goals by Chris Jacke. They followed that with a shocking victory at Dallas last weekend, their first postseason win in 51 years, which served as a warning flare that the Cardinals are a team of the future. Until last week, the last time the Cardinals won a playoff game was 1947 in a one-game postseason. The Chicago Cardinals beat Philadelphia for the NFL championship. Despite his shaky start Sunday, Plummer pulled the Cards to 24-14 by directing an 80-yard drive to start the second half. "Jake is a young quarterback who's got tremendous resiliency. He's a playmaker and he's going to fight you for 60 minutes. He's going to fight you for as many games as you play," Tobin said. "But I'll say this about our football team in general, which Jake is a part of: I think we've come an awful long way this year as far as what kind of team we've got, the way we perceive ourselves. We came up short today but I think that we laid the foundation this year for some good football teams in the future." Tobin said there's still lots of room for improvement. "To me, you play in this league to win the Super Bowl and any time you fall short of that, I don't think that you can be satisfied," Tobin said. "But you have to go in increments sometimes and I think we made giant strides this year as far as organization, as far as football team, the maturity of our football players." Mario Bates, who had a trio of 1-yard touchdown runs, said the Vikings were simply too good for an upstart team. "They're like a machine," he said. "Our wrench just wasn't big enough to stop them."
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