Written Oct. 17, 2026, when the site launched.
Five field goals and no touchdown at home against a winless team will get a quarterback booed, and Kyler Murray heard what the AP called "mild rounds of boos" on Sunday. The number everyone will quote is 0 for 3 in the red zone. We think it's the wrong number to worry about. One of those three trips ended in kneel-downs on purpose, and the offense moved the ball against Miami better than 15 points suggests. Where it stalled was further out: in the middle of the field, and on two short fields the defense handed it.
The 0-for-3, one trip at a time
The first came at the end of the first half. The Vikings went 61 yards in 2:43, reached the Miami 15 with 10 seconds and their last timeout left, threw one incompletion and sent out Will Reichard for a 33-yarder. That one ran out of clock as much as anything.
The second was the real miss. Leading 12-10, Minnesota took the ball at its own 29 late in the third quarter and ran 15 plays for 60 yards over 8:30. It stalled at the Miami 11, where Aaron Jones Sr. caught a pass short of the first down and fumbled it out of bounds. Reichard made it 15-10 from 29 yards.
The third was the choice. On third-and-5 from the 10 with about two minutes left, T.J. Hockenson caught an 8-yarder wide open and slid down at the 2. The Dolphins were out of timeouts, so Murray knelt three times and the game was over.
"Once you get the first down, you've got to get down," Hockenson said, per the AP. "It was tough. I saw that goal line and I wanted it, but it's for the betterment of the team that we ended on offense."
Kevin O'Connell's version was shorter: "If we want to score, we should do it earlier."
So the red-zone record is really one clock-shortened drive and one 15-play march that ended in a field goal. That's not good, but it isn't a crisis.
Where the offense actually stalled
Three of Reichard's five kicks came from 41, 47 and 50 yards. Those drives died between the Miami 23 and 32, which tells you more about what went wrong than the red-zone line does. The Vikings got into field-goal range all day and rarely got much closer.
The short fields bother us more. In the first quarter Minnesota started a possession at the Miami 38 and kicked a 47-yarder after gaining 9 yards. In the second quarter Dallas Turner sacked Malik Willis and forced a fumble, Blake Cashman recovered, and the offense took over near midfield and went three-and-out. That's two gifts from the defense turned into three points.
Pass protection was the other leak. Miami's defense had no sacks in its first three games, per the AP, and sacked Murray four times for 34 yards; Zach Sieler had two of them.
The case that the offense found something
Minnesota ran 72 plays to Miami's 37, outgained the Dolphins 336 to 198, had 20 first downs to their 8, converted 8 of 18 third downs and held the ball for 39:11. The AP counted 14 of the fourth quarter's 15 minutes in Vikings hands, with eight first downs.
They did it without Justin Jefferson (ankle), who missed his first game since Week 12 of the 2023 season, and without Jordan Mason (thumb) for the third straight game. They also played most of the second half without two of their best blockers, the AP reported. Left guard Donovan Jackson (knee) was sidelined in the first quarter. Left tackle Christian Darrisaw (neck) was hurt in the second, came back after halftime, and was pulled again as a precaution for a concussion evaluation after a second hit. The 15-play drive and the game-ending drive both happened after that.
"That door will get kicked down soon," Murray said.
Hockenson is the reason the offense held together. He caught all 13 of his targets for 119 yards, tying his career high for catches, according to the AP, and four of those catches came on the 15-play drive. The AP's read was that Murray was "often tentative and unsteady in the pocket" until Hockenson's catches opened up the field. Murray finished 27 of 37 for 247 yards without a turnover.
Hockenson's day cuts the other way too. When Murray needed a play, the ball went to one tight end over and over. That works for a week without Jefferson, and it's a thin plan for a season.
The defense, and the kicker
The defense had the easier day to grade. Miami netted 76 yards on 21 plays in the first half and didn't finish a single possession past midfield (AP). Willis went 9 for 17 for 85 yards, and Turner had two sacks. The Dolphins got 10 points in the third quarter, and most of that came from one play: Ollie Gordon II's 53-yard run on third-and-5 set up a field goal, and Gordon scored from 12 yards on the next drive. Miami averaged 5.4 yards a play; take that one run away and it's about 4.
The Dolphins helped too, with nine penalties for 55 yards, one of them an illegal-touching flag that wiped out Chris Bell's 68-yard touchdown catch.
"You hate the feeling of continuing to get better without actually gaining wins on the win column, but as we see, we're going out there and competing," Willis said.
Then there's Reichard, five for five. Vikings fans aren't built to relax during field goals, and anyone who grew up with this team knows why. The crowd seems to be coming around on this one, though. The AP reported he drew a loud roar when he showed up on the videoboard at the two-minute warning.
Where this leaves 4-0
The AP notes this is the Vikings' second 4-0 start in three years and their second game this season without a touchdown. In Tampa, the punt return and three long kicks did most of the scoring while the offense managed one drive. This week the offense moved the ball for four quarters without its best receiver and, for most of the second half, without two of its best blockers. It still has to turn that yardage into touchdowns, and the work starts between the opponent's 35 and 20, where three of these drives ran out of steam.
Next up is a trip to New Orleans on Sunday (schedule).
Sources: ESPN box score, drives and play-by-play; the AP's game story and quotes, via ESPN.