If you were lucky enough to watch the Vikings game yesterday, you caught what is now being described as both “the game of the year” and “the game of the decade” on social media. A game that had a recovered fumble in the end zone after the Bills had already thrown dirt on our grave. As well as a catch from Justin “JJ2K” Jefferson that would make Odell Beckham blush. And of course, a game that had the usual Vikings things. This is Sköliosis, after all. Greg Joseph had to miss an extra point, so that we ended up in overtime. And Josh Allen would somehow tie the game with under a minute left after most Vikings fans had already quick triggered a “BEST VIKINGS GAME EVER” text to their buddies.

This Sunday was special, no doubt. A second “Minnesota Miracle” of sorts.

Now, imagine you were able to experience this game of the decade at a sportsbook in Las Vegas on a guys’ trip this weekend.

All of your Vikings fandom put to the test, as you placed your NFL bets with the group. Our group of five (“Cinco Grande”) high school and college buddies had a tough decision to make. Do you bet on the 7-1 Vikings that you secretly worry might be made of paper mâché on the road in Orchard Park against the Bills, who most pundits considered to be in a different tax bracket than the Purple? Or do you assume this Vikings season has been too good to be true, assume the princess will turn into a frog, and bet on the Bills? Sadly, we chose the latter. Well, actually, it’s a bit more complicated.

This regrettable decision to bet on the Bills was foreshadowed when we picked our outfits for the day on Sunday. I had packed a Jared Allen #69 jersey, complete with a white t-shirt to wear underneath. But Sunday morning, for whatever reason—I went with something more discreet. Well, as discreet as salmon shorts and a matching golf shirt can be. Another guy in our group had packed his own lucky purple Vikings slippers, but those too would be left back in the room. In our defense, we started the weekend with the right intentions. At one point we had even planned to watch the YouTube video below from the self-proclaimed creator of the gritty so our group of late ‘40s dad bods could gritty all over the sports book at the Wynn casino.

In the end, we didn’t wear purple and we didn’t dance, I mostly blame Jon Hamm.

Why pin our transgressions on Jon Hamm? Well, the night before our group had bet on the Vegas Knights even though we had shared a roulette table with known St. Louis Blues fan Hamm, who was in town for the game. The Knights lost to the Blues, and we felt bad for not reading the signs around us. Rather than trust that playing roulette with Don Draper might, in fact, be a sign to bet on St. Louis, we opted to bet on the hometown Knights because we felt it would be “bad juju,” if we didn’t.

You heard that correctly, a guys’ trip of Minnesotans bet on the Bills Sunday morning because, well, deep down we thought it was a better bet. We chose to use our heads, instead of our purple hearts. And when the snow started falling in Buffalo, and Kirk Cousins kept falling down—I must say, early in the game we felt pretty good about turning to the dark side. After all, how can we possibly expect a quarterback who appears to be equal parts Cub Scout dad, Chevy Chase, Ned Flanders, and Gerald Ford to lead us to victory against one of the NFL’s elite? Sure, the Vikings had a good record, but the Bills were actually a good team.

Or so we thought. This is when things got interesting. By the end of the game our group of guys would almost reach a new level of losing, nearly recording the extremely rare quadruple “L.” Let’s recap the hole we (almost) went into, and the bold move we had to make to save the day, and quite possibly help reverse the curse for the Vikings.

LOSS #1.

We bet against our team. We automatically take the first “L” just for putting money on the Bills. And since this is a confession, let’s go all the way. We bet $40 total. So, technically we sold our souls and jumped off the Viking ship for the paltry sum of two twenty-dollar bills split by five guys.

While shameful, betting against the Vikings as a Vikings fan isn’t a new phenomenon. In fact, it’s a quite popular emotional coping mechanism. As my buddy put it, “I’ll pay for a win.” In other words, he’s willing to bet on Vikings opponents because if the Vikings win he’s happy, and if the Vikings lose . . .he wins money. I, on the other hand, felt pretty gross betting against the Vikings. Even though there were large stretches of the game where our entire group felt like we had outsmarted the system. Especially when Cousins got rattled and started tossing picks under pressure.

NEAR LOSS #2, #3.

With :41 left in the game. All the Bills had to do was run out the clock from their goal line and they had the victory. Had this happened, this would have given our group of Vikings fans (can we still call ourselves that) another pair of losses in addition to betting against our team. Had Allen not fumbled we would have had loss #2 because the Vikings would have lost the game, and loss #3 because the Bills wouldn’t have covered the spread of 6.5 points, so we would have lost money too.

Yes, we were flirting with a new level of losing. And that’s saying a lot as Vikings fans. Yes, somehow at the Wynn sports book we almost created a new portal to the multiverse, barely averting disaster and a 4x “L” to hang on our foreheads right above our bloodshot eyes.

The universe has a funny way of speaking to you in a Las Vegas sportsbook. At this point, the last thing our group needed was another reminder that we had chosen “bad juju” by betting on the Bills for this game. But next thing we knew multiple screens in the sportsbook were filled with replays of the Chiefs JuJu Smith-Schuster being carted off the field with a serious injury in the Chiefs Jaguars game. What did this mean? Was our bad juju about to leave us?

It would seem so as luckily, for our posse of Purple Pontius Pilates and all of Vikings nation, Erik Kendricks recovered a very Kirk-Cousins like fumble in the end zone from Josh Allen.

After the Allen fumble, Vikings fans went into “Minnesota Miracle” levels of euphoria. If you want to know if you’re actually a Vikings fan, all you have to do is look at your messages from yesterday and see how many texts you received from people you barely know that reached out to you about the game. Most anyone with purple in their veins should have received at least a few “BEST VIKINGS GAME EVER” notes from strangers, distant relatives and former co-workers, or at least a “WOW” text or two.

In the middle of the high, my buddies and I had the presence of mind to remember, this is Sköliosis . . .and these are our Vikings. After we all got done jumping around the sports book acting like the 1980 Olympic team rushing to the podium together or a foursome with a hole-in-one, it hit us. There was too much time left. And if anyone should know it only takes :13 seconds to do something amazing . . .it’s Josh Allen. And he had more time than that! In true Vikings fashion, it appeared they had given us another “Minnesota Miracle,” while leaving just enough time on the clock so it could still be taken away.

Since Greg Joseph had missed the extra point late, we knew even if the Bills (our bet) came back to tie things up (which they did), we had no way to win the bet. With the spread at 6.5 points, even if things went to overtime, and the Bills scored a touchdown they wouldn’t kick the extra point. We were dead in the water.

This is the moment, as a Vikings fan, you need to look in the mirror. You need to look in the mirror, and ask yourself WWJHD What Would Jon Hamm Do? And this is precisely what we did. We decided to hell with that $40 ticket, and we rushed the betting window at the Wynn trying to make an overtime bet for the Vikings to win the game. And when the casino said they were closed for action, we didn’t let that deter us. We placed a $100 bet online for the Vikings to win in OT on a gambling app.

In gambling terms this is the equivalent of the triple dog dare in “Christmas Story.” We were laying in the fetal position at rock bottom and at great risk of recording the rare quadruple L.

If the Vikings didn’t find a way to win in overtime we would have 1) betrayed our team betting on the Bills 2) lost a bet on the Bills who didn’t cover 3) lost bet #2 trying to redeem ourselves on the Vikes in OT and 4) and despite the magic, the Vikings would have lost the game.

But that’s not what happened, now is it?

In hindsight, maybe we needed to find the edge and be willing to risk it all. Maybe we needed to stare into the abyss for the Vikings curse to be officially broken. Maybe we needed to go all the way down the tunnel to see the top? I’m not sure what role we actually played in this, but considering we nearly recorded a historic quadruple loss—deciding to double down on the OT victory feels notable. In the end, we did our part.

The sports book was electric. We even bumped into Jon Hamm later, which felt appropriate as the entire universe was aligned and a critical 4th quarter touchdown had been scored by another Ham, C.J. Hamm which had helped the Vikings close the gap before Joseph’s extra point miss.

It’s good to be a Vikings fan right now. We’re 8-1, and don’t have a care in the world. We get to sit in our hotel room, now wearing those Vikings slippers, scrolling the internet looking for recaps of the game. And this Vikings season has had no shortage of “DVD Extras” to help you relive the experience including replays of Justin Jefferson’s catch and his odds to win MVP.

Post-game we’re now trained to wait for the plane videos. This time it would be “The Closer” Patrick Peterson flexing in the chains. Probably smart to switch things up, as it felt like we were headed straight for Kirk Cousins dancing in chains in just his tighty-whities.

In the end, this victory however unlikely, used the same recipe the Vikings have been using all season. Start the game with a perfectly scripted PSA-Graded 10 opening drive for a touchdown. Proceed to wallow in our Vikings-ness for one or two quarters, enough to make you wonder if they were ever good in the first place. Then wait for our plucky defense to make a few plays and for Captain Kirk to lead us to come-from-behind victory. At one point tonight they flashed a stat that Cousins had over twenty comeback wins in the 4th quarter, including a whopping four this season. What planet are we on?

Is the curse lifted? Only time will tell, but for now let’s just enjoy this. Because if this Vikings season has taught us anything it’s to stop using our heads, and start trusting our purple hearts.