By Matthew T.F. Harrington

Very little went right for the Oakland Raiders in their second preseason contest. They dropped a 20-12 decision to the undefeated Minnesota Vikings, with starters barely getting in a quarter and two-thirds of work due to a thunderstorm that suspended the game for over an hour.

The majority of starters exited the contest at the 6:45 mark, the moment that lightning struck near TCF Bank Stadium forcing the officials to evacuate the bowl of the stadium. At that point, the two teams were tied 6-6 after the Raiders cashed in on a Latavius Murray two yard run and Minnesota put six on the board with a 10 yard connection from quarterback Teddy Bridgewater to Charles Johnson. Raiders Quarterback Derek Carr completed 4 of 8 passes, putting up 78 yards.

Christian Ponder, showered by boos from a crowd ungrateful of his four years under center in the Twin Cities, led the second team on a drive to take the lead fresh off the resumption of play. Ponder helped author a 9 play, 54 yard advance that ended in a 26-yard Giorgio Tavecchio field goal and a 9-6 advantage for the Silver and Black with 4:18 left in the half.

The Vikes rallied to take the lead late in the first half, finding the end zone on a four yard pass from Shaun Hill to Chase Ford with 8 seconds left. The Raiders pulled within a point on a 37-yarder from Tavecchio with 5:25 left in the third, but failed to generate any offense beyond that in the second half. Back-up quarterbacks Matt McGloin (5-for-7,  20 yards) and Chris Fajardo (1-for-4, 11 yards) each threw a pick during their sets of snaps. McGloin’s interception came at the Raiders own 12 yard line, putting Minnesota in the red zone for an easy scoring opportunity. They would convert, with Blake Renaud scoring from the 1 yard line for the final score of the game to make it 20-12 with 2:42 left in the third.

The Raiders defense allowed 22 first downs, including allowing Minnesota to move the chains on 9 of 17 third-down situations. On both sides of the ball Oakland reverted back to its old ways. One week after taking two penalties, the Raiders were flagged for 13 penalties totaling 106 yards.

Oakland went straight from the game to the airport to catch a charter back to the Bay Area. The Silver and Black will return to Napa where they’ll resume training camp, wrapping it up before Sunday night’s contest against the Arizona Cardinals.

NOTES:

Christian Ponder saw the first reps with the second team, putting him in line to take on the back-up role from Matt McGloin….Michael Dyer had the majority of carries, collecting 45 yards on 12 carries. Latavius Murray was second with four carries….Trindon Holliday and Trent Richardson each took a kick-off, with Holliday bringing the ball back 23 yards to Richardson’s 11…Amari Cooper had a team-high 40 receiving yards, all coming on a single catch that preceded Murray’s touchdown in the first quarter. Brice Butler had a team-topping 3 catches, but only 26 yards. Michael Crabtree was only targeted once and had no catches…