End of 3rd Quarter: Arizona Cardinals 14 Detroit Lions 6

The Detroit Lions started off the third quarter with a couple of big plays.  Lions quarterback Calvin Johnson caught an 15-yard pass and then running back Joique Bell ran off 21-yards.   However after a sack of quarterback Matthew Stafford by Arizona Cardinals linebacker Alex Okafor on the next second down, it forced the Lions into a third and 20.  They did not convert and had to punt.

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The Cardinals moved the ball a bit on the next drive.  Quarterback Drew Stanton was able to complete a nice third down pass to John Brown.  However on the next set of downs there was a mix-up on the hand off from Stanton to running back Andre Ellington.  Ellington got up slowly and was replaced by running back Stepfan Taylor.

Taylor was able to run off five-yards to make the third down more manageable however Stanton’s deep pass to receiver Michael Floyd was broken up.  It looked like there could have been some push off but there wasn’t much argument from the Cardinals.

The Lions got the ball back and were forced into a third down but once again they were able to convert the first down on a pass to Calvin Johnson.  Rookie defensive end Kareem Martin had a roughing the passer call on him after Stafford had already thrown the ball away.  Defensive coordinator Todd Bowles was clearly not happy with him.

After that the Lions couldn’t get much further.  Linebacker Larry Foote made a huge tackle and then after Stafford had to call a timeout, on the next two plays the Cardinals defense came up huge.  Safety Tyrann Mathieu made a great play on a knock down.  Then on the nxt play safety Rashad Johnson intercepted Stafford.

However after the interception the Cardinals were not able to muster much offense.  The drive started off bad with a false start by tackle Bobby Massie.  Stanton on third down was almost intercepted again but was dropped by safety James Ihedigbo.