The Detroit Lions and New Orleans Saints will square off in a Week 1 matchup at Ford Field, kicking off the first regular-season game of the 2026 season for each team.
“This opponent, it’s a hungry opponent,” Lions coach Dan Campbell said earlier in the week. “It’s a new turnover from what I remember when I was there. There are a few holdovers, but most of this, it’s a new roster. And there’s a lot of young, hungry players, talented players. You could see their progression as the season went on last
year towards the end of the year… this will be a good opponent, but we’ve got them in our house, and we’ll be ready to go.”
Let’s take a closer look at this matchup and predict what the Lions will do to earn a victory over the Saints in this week’s Honolulu Blueprint.
Saints base schemes
For a detailed look at the opposing scheme, make sure you check out our complementary breakdown piece: Lions Week 1 preview: Breaking down Saints’ offensive and defensive schemes.
Prediction 1: Offense dinks-and-dunks, winning with accuracy and YAC
As I talked about in my breakdown of the Saints’ defensive scheme, New Orleans runs a base 3-4 front with a modified version of Vic Fangio’s zone-match coverage scheme on the back end—which has become very popular in recent years. Essentially, the Saints spend a lot of time in Cover-3 (nearly half their defensive snaps in 2025) with multiple linebackers who live in the intermediate range, allowing them to drop into coverage and/or stay close to the line to defend the run.
This approach by the Saints keeps bodies up front to stop the run, jams up passing lanes, and protects against the deep ball. To counter this approach, the Lions will need to be patient, be deliberate with their decisions, and take what’s available to them. Fortunately, for Detroit, they have the offensive weapons to put pressure on the Saints’ scheme.
With elite weapons in the slot—namely Amon-Ra St. Brown and Sam LaPorta—and a quarterback who is best known for his accuracy, Jared Goff will likely spend most of this game looking to get the ball in his playmakers’ hands and letting them win with yards after the catch (YAC).
While this approach from the Lions will require Goff to be consistently accurate and make smart decisions, that’s right in his wheelhouse.
Prediction 2: Creative play calling with Jahmyr Gibbs leads to big numbers
Sunday will mark Jahmyr Gibbs’ first game as a true “bell cow” back, as the Lions plan to give him the majority of offensive snaps at running back moving forward. The last time Gibbs was the sole primary option at running back was in 2024, when David Montgomery missed time with an MCL injury. In those three games, Gibbs averaged:
- 21.3 rushing attempts per game
- 121.7 rushing yards
- 1.7 touchdowns
- 3.7 receptions
- 41 receiving yards
Those numbers are terrific, and there are reasons to believe Gibbs could match or exceed that output this season. One of the things that make Gibbs such a dynamic offensive weapon is that he can attack defenses in a variety of ways, and offensive coordinator Drew Petzing has prioritized finding creative ways to get Gibbs the football.
Against a Saints front that finished the 2025 season eighth in DVOA vs. the run, Gibbs will be challenged on runs. And while the Lions will certainly try to establish the run as part of their identity, creative play calling by Petzing—getting Gibbs in space via screens, Wheel and Texas routes, etc.—should be the key to breaking through the Saints’ defense.
As we saw in those previous “bell cow” games from Gibbs, 25 touches should be expected for the superstar back, and if Petzing shows some of the things we saw in camp, Gibbs will have a chance to put up big numbers.
Prediction 3: A lot of “Base” formations vs Saints
The Saints finished 27th in passing offense in 2025, and while starting quarterback Tyler Shough certainly helped improve the unit, they enter the season in the bottom half of most rankings. While the Saints invested in offensive skill players this offseason, they’re dealing with injuries (first-round pick Jordan Tyson is on IR and RB Alvin Kamara is working through an MCL injury) and are still a work in progress.
Like the Lions (prior to elevating Tom Kennedy), the Saints are only rostering four wide receivers. Unlike the Lions, most of the Saints’ talent at wide receiver is unproven. Superstar Chris Olave headlines the group, and DeVaughn Vele has shown to be a solid WR2, but behind them, they’re rolling with two Day 3 rookies. Now, the Saints do have a solid tight end in Juwan Johnson, which gives them a third pass-catching option, but New Orleans will likely need to rely heavily on their running backs.
With top free-agent acquisition running back Travis Etienne expected to start and be heavily involved in the Saints’ offensive attack, look for the Lions to counter with “base” defense to fill rushing gaps and challenge the Saints to go to the air.
Furthermore, as pointed out by Anthony Balaj in his key player matchup preview, “the Saints and Shough ranked 30th in the NFL in play-action rate at just 18.6% in 2025, per NFL NextGen Stats,” which should further allow the Lions to stay in base. With no real threat of disguise from the offense, the Lions can confidently play off their keys with their base personnel, thus allowing them to be in better positions more consistently.
This approach would also allow the Lions to unleash some of the new “juice” they acquired in the offseason.
Prediction 4: Offseason “Juice” leads to increased pressures and sacks
The Saints quarterback room is still very young, and while there are a lot of encouraging signs for Shough’s development, one area he struggled with last season was sacks. In 2025, the Saints surrendered 49 sacks (2.88 per game), with Shough giving up 31 in his nine starts (averaging over three sacks per game). The story was similar with pressures; as a whole team, they surrendered 227 (13.4 per game), with Shough succumbing to 119 (13.22 per game).
In addition to relying on Shough’s experience to help them improve in this area, the Saints also made a point to address their offensive line this offseason and made a strong move by signing LG David Edwards. On paper, the Saints certainly upgraded their offensive line, but they’ll be tested early with the Lions’ new defensive front.
“There’s an emphasis (on adding pass-rushing talent this offseason); we wanted to add more juice and more ability to get after the quarterback,” general manager Brad Holmes said earlier this month.
Last season, the Lions’ pass-rushing statistics were respectable. They finished the season with 49 sacks (fourth most in the NFL) and 235 pressures (seventh), but they struggled immensely in one area: Time to pressure. On average, the Lions took 2.86 seconds to generate pressure (30th in the NFL), and they made a strong offseason effort to improve in this area.
The first and most obvious way the Lions improved in this area was player talent. They signed DJ Wommum and drafted Derrick Moore (in the second round) to reinvigorate their rush end position, while also getting more athletic inside by expanding Mekhi Wingo’s role and drafting Skyler Gill-Howard. Alim McNeill’s return to full health and Tyleik Williams’s second-year development also helped boost the Lions in this area.
The second and less obvious way the Lions improved their pass rush was in their schematic approach. Defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard insists that the Lions aren’t doing anything new up front, but the difference on the field has been noticeable. This could simply be a matter of getting the “right” guys into the scheme, but I believe Sheppard is leaning more into the athleticism of his front than in the past, which allows him to use more stunts, cross-face approaches, and pre-snap movement to disrupt offenses.
By altering their approach to pass rush, the Lions should not only see an uptick in production, but they should find themselves in more advantageous spots down-to-down—something I expect to see against the Saints.
