Despite Playoff Ending, Lions Still Grew into Legitimate Contenders in 2014

The cruel finality of the NFL postseason took a bite out of the Detroit Lions' 2014 season, but 11 wins and a near road victory in the NFC Wild Card Round should be viewed as a growing moment for the franchise—not just a heartbreaking disappointment. 

A team short on accomplishments in recent years accomplished its fair share in 2014. 

The Lions won 11 games for just the third time since 1932. A talented defense blossomed into one of the best statistical groups in football under coordinator Teryl Austin. Receiver Golden Tate emerged as one of the top free-agent signings of the year. The "same ol' Lions" bucked the club's self-destructive trends under first-year head coach Jim Caldwell and made the postseason in a top-heavy conference with five teams winning 11 or more games. 

It then took a handful of mistakes and a couple of critical officiating blunders to steal away the club's first playoff win since 1991. 

Wins	Year	Playoff Result
12	1991	Lost Conference Championship
11	2014	Lost Wild Card
11	1962	-
11*	1931	-
10	2011	Lost Wild Card
10	1995	Lost Wild Card
10	1993	Lost Wild Card
10	1970	Lost Divisional
10	1953	Won Championship
10	1934	-

The NFL is especially cruel that way. The Lions quietly established themselves as a legitimate contender over 17 grueling weeks, only to have one chaotic quarter of football end it all in a flash. No re-dos. No second chances. No Game 2 of a five-game series.

Detroit, like 30 other NFL locales, will finish the 2014 season without the ultimate goal in hand. 

Yet disappointment to end one year can be an ingredient needed to grow the next. Just ask Tate, who once lost in heartbreaking fashion in the postseason as a member of the Seattle Seahawks, only to win the Super Bowl the following year. 

"Yeah, this season is over and it's tough to swallow right now but, hey, the Detroit Lions are not done," Tate said, via Michael Rothstein of ESPN.com. "We're going to go out there and have a heck of an offseason and come back and be ready and be focused. This could be the start of something great, I think."

The Lions took one big step in the right direction this past season, burying the comedic finish of 2013 with a 2014 club that went toe-to-toe with the Green Bay Packers for a division title and a first-round bye in the NFC.

Detroit's 11 wins were tied for the second-most in franchise history, and the most since 1991 (12). Winning 11 games isn't overly meaningful in every NFL city, but it is in Detroit, where the Lions have only recorded double-digit wins six times since the 1970 merger. 

Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

A big reason for the four-win turnaround from 2013 was the defense, which became the team's steadying force. Under Austin, the team's first-year defensive coordinator, the Lions finished third in points (17.6/game), second in yards (300.9) and first in rushing yards (69.3) allowed. Only five teams since the merger allowed fewer total rushing yards than Detroit's 1,109. And the Lions also allowed only 3.17 yards per carry, the best mark in the NFL since 2010. 

Overall, the Lions produced three All-Pros on defense, one for every level: defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh, linebacker DeAndre Levy and safety Glover Quin. 

On offense, the Lions struck gold with Tate, an underused receiver in Seattle who took full advantage of his opportunity in Detroit. As occasionally the No. 1 option with Calvin Johnson out but more often as the No. 2, Tate caught 99 passes for almost 1,331 yards and four touchdowns. He led the NFL in yards after the catch while hauling in at least four passes in 15 of the club's 17 games. 

The Lions signed Tate to a five-year deal worth a modest $31 million last March. The 16th-highest-paid receiver in 2014, Tate finished the season sixth in catches and seventh in receiving yards. 

Maybe most encouraging about Detroit's 2014 season was the absence of a late collapse. 

The 2013 Lions started 6-3 but finished 7-9, losing six of the final seven games. The 2014 Lions started 7-2 and finished 11-5, using a four-game win streak after tough road losses in Arizona and New England to ward off any self-imposed destruction. Detroit ended up losing the de facto NFC North title game in Week 17, but playing in a season finale of such magnitude certainly beats the year prior, in which the Lions had nothing to play for by the final week. 

The calming influence of Caldwell played a role. There was no observable panic from the Lions at 7-4, despite back-to-back ugly losses on the road. Detroit simply took care of business over the next four winnable games to clinch a playoff spot in the ultra-competitive NFC. 

The Lions' playoff trip came to a gut-wrenching end. But going up 14-0 early and holding a late lead on the road against a 12-win Cowboys team should leave Detroit with the confidence that this year's club could have played with any team left in the postseason field. 

Now comes the burden of maintaining and building on success, which can oftentimes be more difficult than first achieving it. 

	Task
1.	Decision on Ndamukong Suh, a soon-to-be unrestricted free agent
2.	Fixing the offensive line
3.	Continued growth from Matthew Stafford
4.	Add more help in the secondary
5.	Replace Teryl Austin?

The Lions have work to do this offseason. Both lines require attention, and quarterback Matthew Stafford needs to take a step forward.

Suh, the defense's core and best player, is scheduled to be an unrestricted free agent. He will be joined by fellow defensive linemen Nick Fairley, C.J. Mosley, George Johnson and Andre Fluellen. Getting Suh back will be the biggest storyline of the entire offseason, but it appears possible the Lions will be dealing with a transformation up front on defense regardless. 

On the other side, the offensive line needs a serious rebound after a shaky 2014 season. Center Dominic Raiola and guard Rob Sims are both free agents, and guard Larry Warford enters the offseason dealing with a knee injury. The Lions may need to add as many as two or three new starters. 

Stafford could certainly use the help. He was sacked 45 times in 2014, by far his career high. While he cut down on turnovers—throwing only 12 interceptions over 16 games—he often led a simple, unproductive offense.

Caldwell and offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi clearly have a plan for Stafford. This year was seemingly centered around improving decision-making and reteaching Stafford that he can play safe and still win games. But if the Lions are to truly take the next step, he will need to become a protective but more efficient quarterback. He finished the 2014 season with a passer rating under 90 for the third straight year.

It's also entirely possible that the Lions will need to replace Austin, who is already receiving promotional looks from around the NFL. According to Jason La Canfora of CBS, Austin will interview for vacant head coaching opportunities in both Atlanta and San Francisco this week.

For the better part of three quarters on Sunday, Austin's defense shut down Tony Romo, DeMarco Murray and Dez Bryant. He dialed up blitzes and genuinely looked in control of the game, until the Cowboys found a weak spot in the middle of the defense and eventually scored the game's final 17 points. 

Losing Austin would be a significant blow. He extracted every last bit of production out of a unit that never possessed overwhelming talent in the secondary and also lost Fairley and middle linebacker Stephen Tulloch early in the season.

Ronald Martinez/Getty Images

Every playoff team will face hurdles to maintain success. It's the nature of the business, the NFL's inherent mechanism of keeping parity alive and well. The burden will fall on the Lions to jump enough hurdles and remain among the NFC's best.

There's also nothing wrong with reflecting on all Detroit accomplished in 2014. A collection of talented individuals finally became a team, winning 11 games and squashing nightmares of recent seasons. Despite few predicting a trip to the postseason, the Lions became a legitimate contender.

Detroit's 2014 season might still be remembered mostly for Sunday's game, in which both the Lions and officials made crucial mistakes late in another postseason loss.  

But with adversity can come continued growth, and it's clear after 17 games that the Lions have established the groundwork for a new winning culture in Detroit. The next step is building on success and ensuring 2014 wasn't another blip on the radar. 

Zach Kruse covers the NFC North for Bleacher Report. 

Follow @zachkruse2