Two wins in five days have completely changed the mood around the Los Angeles Rams.
A team that seemed unprepared on both offense and defense before their bye week is now looking like a potential playoff contender—if they can continue to build on their successes in those back-to-back games at SoFi Stadium.
After the defense showed its best competitive spirit of the year with four takeaways in a 20-15 victory over Las Vegas last Sunday, the offense had its strongest performance of the season in the 30-20 win against the Vikings on Thursday night.
The return of Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua from long injury absences against Minnesota demonstrated what the Rams can do when Sean McVay has all his key players available.
“I believe in this group,” McVay said. “I believe in the coaches. I believe in the players. I saw resolve. I didn’t see a flinch. And we still have a long way to go. We’ve won two games in five days, but it is just two games. We’ve done a good job of getting ourselves back to where we wanted to be.”
The Rams are now 3-4 and have a series of winnable games coming up until December. McVay and his players have made it clear to the front office that no one should give up on this season yet, which means Los Angeles is less likely to trade away a key player during a rebuilding phase, according to their coach.
Recently, there were rumors that Kupp or Matthew Stafford might leave LA. McVay dismissed the speculation about his star receiver after Kupp caught five passes for 51 yards and a touchdown against Minnesota, and he reaffirmed his stance on Friday morning.
“That’s not a move that we want to make,” McVay said. “There was conversation in regard to people reaching out about (Kupp’s availability), but to say that we were proactively seeking that out, that was something that I had a hard time with. … He’s a Ram, and we expect it to stay that way.”
