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Eric Woodyard
ALLEN PARK, Mich. — David Montgomery says the Detroit Lions are “tired of being close” to winning a Super Bowl, and he declared the 2025 season as a “year of reckoning.”
After a franchise-best 15-win season in 2024, the top-seeded Lions fell short of their Super Bowl goal with a shocking loss against the Washington Commanders in their playoff opener.
“Everybody’s tired of being close,” Montgomery said Sunday. “It’s cool to be close at first, but you don’t want to get comfortable with being close all the time.
“That’s not what you want to be known for, especially when you know you’ve got the guys, you’ve got on this team. You want to finish it, so this is the year for us. The year of the reckoning and the year that we choose that we need to finish.”
The Lions opened training camp Sunday at the Meijer Performance Center with a chip on their shoulder, despite coming off back-to-back NFC North titles.
The sting of last season’s disappointing ending — a 45-31 home loss to Washington in the NFC divisional round — still doesn’t sit well within the group, especially Montgomery, who has big goals this upcoming season.
“This is probably the hungriest that I have been because I feel like a lot of people kind of forget that I’m here in the offense, too,” said Montgomery, who rushed for 775 yards and 12 touchdowns last season. “So, I’m not here to prove anybody wrong. I’m here to prove myself right and be the best teammate that I can be
“But I’ve definitely got a big chip on my shoulder.”
The Lions say they now share a common understanding of what it takes to complete the mission in Detroit, as head coach Dan Campbell has emphasized the importance of sacrificing early on to win it all.
“You don’t work for almost. You work for the whole thing,” said wide receiver Kalif Raymond. “I think at the end of the day, the groundwork that we lay right now is going to determine the small minute details that come with the almost that happened the last few years.”
There’s also an added level of maturity around the organization entering this year that Raymond acknowledged after experiencing the entire building process in Detroit since 2021, when Campbell first arrived.
“It’s a mature team,” Raymond said. “It’s cool to watch these guys grow, but more importantly it’s cool to watch these guys become pros because now they’re vets.
“So, watching them take the take the reins of the younger guys coming in who were once young guys when they came in … the maturity of the team has been phenomenal.”
The Lions are one of four active NFL franchises without a Super Bowl appearance, along with the Cleveland Browns, Jacksonville Jaguars and Houston Texans. Detroit has the second-shortest odds to win the NFC at ESPN BET, behind the defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles.
“I’m still as enthusiastic as ever. I know these guys are,” Campbell said. “There’s a price to be paid to get yourself back into the dance — back into the tournament — and that will never change.
“If we let that slide at all, then we’re going to be sitting here at home in January, and that’s not what we want.”
