{"id":48679,"date":"2025-05-14T05:59:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-14T05:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/48679\/"},"modified":"2025-05-14T05:59:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T05:59:09","slug":"2025-nfl-schedule-lions-thanksgiving-opponent-down-to-6-candidates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/48679\/","title":{"rendered":"2025 NFL schedule: Lions\u2019 Thanksgiving opponent down to 6 candidates"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Detroit Lions<\/a> will host their 86th Thanksgiving Day classic, hoping to improve their overall record on the holiday of 38-45-2. <\/p>\n

But before we can start predicting wins and losses, we need to know who their opponent will be on Thanksgiving. This year, the Lions host eight different teams at Ford Field for the 2025 NFL season: the Bears, Packers<\/a>, Vikings, Cowboys, Giants, Browns<\/a>, Steelers<\/a>, and Buccaneers<\/a>. <\/p>\n

We already know it won\u2019t be the Cowboys, as they host the second game on Thanksgiving every year. Thanks to another schedule leak on Monday night, we can eliminate a second team from the Thanksgiving Day classic.<\/p>\n

Amazon\u2019s Prime Video announced that the Chicago Bears<\/a> will be playing in this year\u2019s Black Friday game\u2014the NFL matchup that happens literally the day after Thanksgiving. <\/p>\n

That leaves the following teams as potential Thanksgiving Day opponents for the Lions: Packers, Vikings, Giants, Browns, Steelers, and Buccaneers. <\/p>\n

As of late, the NFL has really leaned on divisional matchups for the Lions\u2019 traditional game. Here\u2019s a look at their opponents over the last 10 years: <\/p>\n

2024: Bears
2023: Packers
2022: Bills
2021: Bears
2020: Texans<\/a>
2019: Bears
2018: Bears
2017: Vikings
2016: Vikings
2015: Eagles<\/p>\n

That\u2019s seven out of their last 10 Thanksgiving Day opponents coming from the division. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the last time the Lions played the other opponents on Thanksgiving: <\/p>\n

Giants: 1982
Browns: 1989
Steelers: 1998
Buccaneers: Never<\/p>\n

Will the Lions be paired with the Vikings or Packers again, or will the NFL spice up the holiday game with an unusual matchup? We\u2019ll find out by Wednesday 8 p.m. ET, when the full schedule will be released. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Detroit Lions will host their 86th Thanksgiving Day classic, hoping to improve their overall record on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[10103,146,113,153,154,2506,1296,7,29,147,6,7756,152,14850,151,8403,150,528],"class_list":{"0":"post-48679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-lions","8":"tag-candidates","9":"tag-detroit","10":"tag-detroit-lions","11":"tag-detroit-lions-news","12":"tag-detroit-lions-schedules","13":"tag-detroitlions","14":"tag-down","15":"tag-football","16":"tag-front-page","17":"tag-lions","18":"tag-nfl","19":"tag-nfl-schedule","20":"tag-of","21":"tag-opponent","22":"tag-pride","23":"tag-schedule","24":"tag-thanksgiving","25":"tag-to"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114504660811895293","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}