Jordan Love has found missing piece to lead Packers past Lions on TNF

Heading into their highly anticipated rematch with the Detroit Lions on Thursday Night Football to kick off Week 14, the Green Bay Packers are on a roll.

Winners of three straight following an impressive 30-17 victory over the Miami Dolphins at Lambeau Field on Thanksgiving night, Matt LaFleur & Co. are 9-3 heading into the final five weeks of the season and are in a great position in regards to the NFC playoff picture, as a postseason spot is essentially guaranteed at this point.

Not only have the Packers won their last three, but they've only taken one loss since September. The issue, however, is that one loss came at the hands of the same Lions they'll face at Ford Field on Thursday night.

And while the 24-14 final score from that first matchup in Week 9 might not look that bad, the game was never that close, at least not after the first quarter.

While Green Bay led 3-0 after the first 15 minutes, Detroit scored 24 unanswered points and cruised the rest of the way en route to the 10-point win.

While it's only been just over a month since that embarrassing defeat, the Packers aren't the same team they were then, at least not in a couple of aspects that hurt them significantly in the loss.

And the fixes they've made in these areas could make the difference between a season split with Detroit, which would put them right there in the mix for the NFC North crown, or a season sweep, which would effectively take them out of the running in the division.

Packers' red-zone issues and Jordan Love's interception problems have improved in recent weeks

The Packers didn't have much trouble moving the football against the vaunted Detroit defense in Week 9, racking up 411 total yards. But once they got into the red zone, they simply couldn't finish things off.

In five trips inside the Lions' 20-yard line, Green Bay only found the end zone once. And that came late in the fourth quarter when Emanuel Wilson rushed for a 2-yard score. At that point in the season, the Packers had only scored touchdowns on 47.1% of their trips to the red zone.

During this current winning streak, however, Green Bay has done so 73.3% of the time, the fifth-highest mark in the league over the last three weeks. This run also included a streak of nine straight trips inside the 20 that resulted in a touchdown.

Another aspect that has vastly improved in recent weeks is Love's issue with interceptions. And that issue reared its ugly head against the Lions, as he threw a dreadful and demoralizing pick-six in the final minute of the first half that ultimately gave Detroit a 17-3 lead going into the locker room.

Up to that point, Love had thrown at least one interception in every game he'd played this season and added another coming out of the bye week in Green Bay's one-point win over the Chicago Bears.

In the Packers' last two outings, however, No. 10 has been interception-free, completing 66.7% of his passes for 437 yards with four touchdowns.

If Love can continue this pick-free streak on Thursday night and the Packers can keep scoring touchdowns in the red zone, don't be surprised if Green Bay's winning streak improves to four and the Lions' winning streak stops at 10.

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