NFL Wild Card weekend: Sunday odds & trends

While the AFC has Saturday all to itself on Wild-Card Weekend, the NFC takes the stage on Sunday with its two games.

Odds courtesy of OddsShark.com

At 1:05 p.m. ET, the sixth-seeded Minnesota Vikings visit the No. 3 New Orleans Saints. The current NFL playoff format began in 1992 and just twice previously had a team with 13 victories not earned a first-round playoff bye. The 2019 Saints became the third despite tying for the conference’s best record. The Saints lost a head-to-head tiebreaker with No. 1 San Francisco thanks to a last-second 48-46 loss to the Niners in Week 14. That’s the only defeat for the Saints in their past seven games.

New Orleans lost the tiebreaker for the second seed with Green Bay because the Packers had a 10-2 record against the NFC compared to a 9-3 mark for the Saints. Both the Niners and Packers nearly lost in Week 17 and then New Orleans would have been the No. 1. It was last year with the same 13-3 mark.