Culture
Putting the NFC North’s dominance in context: Best division since realignment?
The NFL’s Thanksgiving schedule delivers three-fourths of what could become the most dominant division since the league realigned in 2002.
The 2024 NFC North is the first division since the 1970 AFL-NFL merger to feature three teams with at least eight victories through Week 12, led by the 10-1 Detroit Lions, who have tied an all-time NFL mark for most victories in a season by at least 38 points (three, all outside the division).
With the Lions facing the division-rival Chicago Bears (4-7) in the early game Thursday before the 8-3 Green Bay Packers play the late game against the AFC East’s Miami Dolphins, the 2024 NFC North — which also includes the 9-2 Minnesota Vikings — stands apart. It could well decide who takes home the Lombardi Trophy.
The Lions (+260), Packers (+750) and Vikings (+850) are among the top seven in Super Bowl odds, per BetMGM, and the top four in odds to win the NFC, along with the Philadelphia Eagles (+325). The Lions remain Super Bowl favorites, comfortably ahead of the Kansas City Chiefs (+450), while the NFC North has the shortest odds to produce the champion at +175, half of the second-place AFC West (+350).
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The chart below shows where all eight divisions have ranked each season since the league realigned in 2002 in point margin per game (X-axis) and win rate (Y-axis) in non-divisional games through the first 12 weeks of each season. The 2024 NFC North (red dot) ranks first among these 184 divisional seasons in average point margin (+9.5) and second in win rate (.765), per TruMedia.
Only the 2022 NFC East (26-7) had a better record than the 2024 NFC North (26-8) in non-division games through Week 12, but the current NFC North had a far better average point margin (+9.5 to +5.1) in these games.
Here’s what you need to know about where the NFC North stands and what it must do to become the most dominant division over a full season since realignment.
1. The NFC North is by far the most dominant division this season.
The scheduling rotation (which we’ll explore later) is part of the equation, but this level of dominance is extreme.
2024 non-divisional game scorecard
| Division | W-L | Point Margin |
|---|---|---|
|
NFC North |
26-8 (.765) |
+323 |
|
AFC West |
19-12 (.613) |
+74 |
|
AFC North |
17-16 (.515) |
+56 |
|
NFC West |
15-15 (.500) |
-33 |
|
NFC East |
15-16 (.484) |
-33 |
|
AFC East |
13-18 (.419) |
-38 |
|
NFC South |
10-18 (.357) |
-138 |
|
AFC South |
11-23 (.324) |
-211 |
AFC North teams lead the way in total victories over opponents who currently have winning records (11) and total non-divisional victories in these games (nine). The NFC North is second with eight and six.
Since 2002, the NFC North’s +323 point margin ranks first by 64 points over the runner-up 2013 NFC West (+259) through Week 12. That is larger than the difference between the 2013 NFC West and the sixth-ranked division in that span, the 2011 NFC North (+200). The table below shows the only divisions since 2002 with PPG margins greater than 7.0 through Week 12, led by the 2024 NFC North.
2002-24 non-division PPG margin (Wk 1-12)
| Division | W-L | PPG Margin |
|---|---|---|
|
2024 NFC North |
26-8 (.765) |
+9.5 |
|
2013 NFC West |
23-9 (.719) |
+8.1 |
|
2002 NFC South |
17-8-1 (.673) |
+7.3 |
|
2008 NFC South |
22-8 (.733) |
+7.2 |
|
2011 NFC North |
19-9 (.679) |
+7.1 |
|
2005 AFC West |
20-10 (.667) |
+7.1 |
2. Strong defense has been the key to the NFC North dominating its non-divisional schedule.
The 2024 NFC North ranks first among 184 divisions since 2002 in defensive EPA per play against non-division opponents, compared to a No. 69 ranking in offensive EPA per play.
| Non-Division Category | 2024 NFC North | Rank of 184 |
|---|---|---|
|
W-L |
26-8 (.765) |
2 |
|
PPG |
26.1 |
16 |
|
PPG allowed |
16.6 |
2 |
|
PPG differential |
+9.5 |
1 |
|
Score differential/play |
+4.86 |
1 |
|
OFF EPA/play |
+0.013 |
69 |
|
DEF EPA/play |
+0.148 |
1 |
All four NFC North teams rank among the NFL’s top 10 in defensive EPA per play across all games this season. They are all in the top five when isolating non-divisional games only. The Lions and Packers also rank among the top 10 on offense across all games and in non-division games.
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3. Dominating a weak AFC South accounts for 61 percent of the NFC North’s +323 point differential in non-division games.
NFC North teams are 8-0 with a +144 differential against the Jacksonville Jaguars and Tennessee Titans. They are 14-2 with a +197 differential against the full AFC South. Bad teams get blown out. The NFC North has played its share of them.
2024 NFC North non-division scorecard
Forty-five percent of the +323 differential in non-division games stems from facing the Jaguars and Titans, while 61 percent stems from facing the AFC South overall.
The six other divisions are a combined 9-9 against the AFC South, with a +14 differential. That includes a 6-7 mark with a +21 differential for AFC East teams.
4. The NFC North has a 6-4 record against non-divisional opponents who had winning records through Week 12. Here’s a full accounting.
The Bears are the only NFC North team without a victory over a team that currently has a winning record. They are 0-3 in those matchups, headlined by their defeat at Washington on a Jayden Daniels Hail Mary. The rest of the NFC North has a 6-1 record in those games, with three victories over Houston, two over Arizona and one over Seattle.
2024 NFC North vs. teams now above .500
| NFC North Team | Wk-Opp | Result | Point Margin |
|---|---|---|---|
|
3-HOU |
W, 34-7 |
+27 |
|
|
6-AZ |
W, 34-13 |
+21 |
|
|
4-SEA |
W, 42-29 |
+13 |
|
|
3-AZ |
W, 20-13 |
+7 |
|
|
10-HOU |
W, 26-23 |
+3 |
|
|
7-HOU |
W, 24-22 |
+2 |
|
|
8-WAS |
L, 18-15 |
-3 |
|
|
1-PHI |
L, 34-29 |
-5 |
|
|
2-HOU |
L, 19-13 |
-6 |
|
|
9-AZ |
L, 29-9 |
-20 |
The NFC North’s record would be 6-3 if we adjusted the parameters to feature non-divisional games against teams that had winning records at kickoff. Victories over Dallas, San Francisco and Tampa Bay would come into play.
5. NFC North teams play 10 more games against non-division opponents this season. Here’s what the division must do to become the most dominant since 2002.
The NFL pushes most division games later in the season for competitive reasons. That leaves only 10 remaining non-division games for the NFC North to build upon its dominance or fall in the rankings. Those games are listed below chronologically and with point spreads pulled together from various sources where available.
Remaining non-division opponents
| NFC North Team | Week | Point Spread |
|---|---|---|
|
13 |
-3.5 (vs. AZ) |
|
|
13 |
-3 (vs. MIA) |
|
|
14 |
+6.5 (at SF) |
|
|
14 |
-5.5 (vs. ATL) |
|
|
15 |
-2 (vs. BUF) |
|
|
15 |
-1 (at SEA) |
|
|
16 |
+2 (at SEA) |
|
|
16 |
-5 (vs. NO) |
|
|
17 |
+3.5 (at SEA) |
|
|
17 |
-5 (at SF) |
The 2013 NFC North holds the full-season record for PPG margin against non-divisional opponents since realignment (+359 in 40 games, for 8.975 per game). That division featured the 13-3 Super Bowl champion Seahawks, the Jim Harbaugh-coached 49ers (12-4), the Bruce Arians-coached Cardinals (10-6) and the 7-9 Rams.
NFC North teams must outscore their 10 remaining non-divisional opponents by 72 points to beat the 2013 NFC West for the best full-season differential since 2002. That would leave the division +395 in 44 games for a +8.977 PPG differential.
The best full-season record against non-divisional opponents since 2002 is shared by the 2013 NFC West and the 2007 NFC South at 30-10 (.750). The NFC North (currently .765 at 26-8) would equal that mark with a 7-3 finish against foes outside the division.
The best team in the NFC North (Detroit) will be at home for the division’s toughest remaining opponent (Buffalo). The Seahawks’ recent improvement on defense could complicate efforts for Chicago, Minnesota and Green Bay to win at Seattle. The 49ers’ decline could help Chicago (Week 14) and Detroit (Week 17).
Green Bay and Minnesota can set the tone in Week 13. Both are favored at home against non-division opponents.
(Photo of Josh Jacobs, center, and three Lions defenders: Stacy Revere / Getty Images)
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Where do you turn when you need advice? A chatbot? A life coach? A wise and trusted friend?
How about a poet? Poets may not be famous for making the best life choices, but because they subject the mess of human existence to the discipline of language, they can be as helpful as any therapist or mentor.
Good poets know the rules and when to break them, which is something they can teach the rest of us.
To wit:
Giving advice is a peculiar literary undertaking. It flourishes in certain popular genres — graduation speeches, newspaper columns, country and western songs and poems like this one — but what, in these contexts, is it really for?
I’m thinking of situations when you don’t urgently need help but nonetheless enjoy reading answers to questions you may not have thought to ask. What interests you isn’t the content of the advice — you could get all the life hacks you want from A.I. — so much as the voice of the person dispensing it.
Wendy Cope is an English poet, born in 1945, who has been a fixture of her country’s literary scene since the 1980s. More recently, her short, buoyant poem “The Orange” has been widely memed online, bringing her to the attention of new readers beyond Britain.
Cope favors rhyme, meter, brisk jokes and tart aperçus. She addresses romance, friendship and the petty absurdities of modern life with disarming good humor. The last line of “The Orange” is “I love you. I’m glad I exist.” Somehow she makes it the opposite of cringe.
This isn’t the kind of poetry you would describe as “confessional.” And yet …
Question 1/7
Stop, if the car is going “clunk”
Or if the sun has made you blind.
Don’t answer e–mails when you’re drunk.
Tap a word above to fill in the highlighted blank.Want to learn this poem by heart? We’ll help.
Fill in the missing words below. You can always refer to the reading by A.O. Scott and full
text above.Let’s start with the first stanza.
A strong sense of place can deeply influence a story, and in some cases, the setting can even feel like a character itself. This week’s literary geography quiz highlights places where authors were born (or lived) that later became locations in their books. To play, just make your selection in the multiple-choice list and the correct answer will be revealed. At the end of the quiz, you’ll find links to the works if you’d like to do further reading.
AMERICA, U.S.A.: How Race Shadows the Nation’s Anniversaries, by Eddie S. Glaude Jr.
For those of us in the national memory-keeping business, anniversaries hold near-totemic power. Satisfyingly round units of time, ideally bearing fancy, Latin-derived names, serve as the overburdened pegs on which to hang think pieces and museum exhibits, revisionist documentaries and maudlin public ceremonies. The arbitrary nature of such occasions is precisely what gives them their charge, inviting us to set aside complacency and submit to a comprehensive check-in.
In his new book, “America, U.S.A.,” Eddie S. Glaude Jr. presents an intriguing variation on the genre, seeing the country’s 250th birthday as an anniversary of anniversaries: 50 years since the malaise-ridden, schlock-heavy Bicentennial. A century since the subdued Prohibition-era Sesquicentennial. A century and a half since telegraphed reports of George Armstrong Custer’s defeat by the Lakota and Cheyenne at Little Bighorn rudely interrupted the Gilded Age Republic’s 100th birthday party.
If an anniversary offers a snapshot of a moment, the core of Glaude’s book is an old-timey photo album, a collection of notable episodes from earlier national reckonings, long-ago glances in the mirror. An estimable scholar of Black history, politics and religion at Princeton — best known for “Begin Again,” his 2020 meditation on James Baldwin’s relevance for our times — Glaude focuses, as his subtitle puts it, on “how race shadows the nation’s anniversaries.”
Such celebrations, he contends, have never really been the moments for honest self-reflection they are often advertised to be. Instead, the nation usually shatters the mirror, refusing to accept what it prefers not to see. “American anniversaries are often moments to turn a blind eye to the evils of the past and the present,” Glaude writes, “to suppress the fact of America’s divided soul.”
It’s a clever concept, and, needless to say, perfectly timed. Last year, Glaude notes, the Trump administration executed a hostile takeover of the government’s studiously bipartisan 250th anniversary planning. It is now preparing a program that is certain to conceal more than it reveals about the country ostensibly being celebrated.
Glaude, in no mood for celebration, argues that such omissions and evasions also defined commemorations in the past. In 1875, Frederick Douglass predicted “one grand Centennial hosannah of peace and good will to all the white race of this country.” He was right: The nation reached 100 years old at a crucial moment in the post-Civil War fight over racial equality, with white Northerners ready to give up on Southern Reconstruction. The occasion would help the once-warring sections to reunite around a shared commitment to white supremacy. On May 10, 1876, at the opening of the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, the police tried to bar Douglass from the grandstand, until a white politician vouched for him.
The 150th anniversary came soon after a resurgent Ku Klux Klan successfully pushed for a restrictive immigration law aimed at keeping America a “Nordic” nation. At the lavishly funded, lightly attended celebrations in Philadelphia, Black veterans of World War I were excluded from marching in the opening parade. A writer with The Associated Negro Press wondered “what was in the breast of those black men who fought to make America safe for Democracy and on Monday stood on the sidelines, forgotten, as the Nordic strode by in all his vain pride.”
By 1976, when the nation marked its Bicentennial, the violence of the ’60s had destroyed any semblance of consensus. Vietnam and Watergate had eroded trust in the government. The commission initially tasked with organizing the anniversary was disbanded amid reports of corruption. Corporations filled the vacuum, Glaude explains, with “star-spangled whoopee cushions; patriotic toilet seats; Liberty hamburgers; red, white and blue beer cans.” The author, around 8 years old at the time, dimly remembers donning a pair of tricolor trousers.
A half-century later, Glaude is refreshingly honest about the depths of his despair. “I do not love America, and never have, especially now,” he writes in one of the more startling opening sentences I’ve read in some time. He dismisses this year’s Semiquincentennial as reaching back “to a storybook America that requires either the banishment of Black people from view or the reduction of our role in the country’s history, so as to affirm America’s ongoing quest to be a more perfect union.”
Undoubtedly true. But Trump doesn’t own the country, at least not yet, nor the 250th anniversary of one of the most radically liberatory and confusingly contradictory events in world history — an inspiration, as Glaude shows, even to critical observers of the American experiment, like Douglass. Far from the revanchist MAGA-palooza in Washington, I suspect this summer’s unasked-for invitation to national soul-searching may surprise us yet.
Despite his despair, Glaude concludes that “the past still offers resources for us to freedom-dream.” So, too, does this book.
AMERICA, U.S.A.: How Race Shadows the Nation’s Anniversaries | By Eddie S. Glaude Jr. | Crown | 270 pp. | $31
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