The Detroit Lions need to find themselves in a hurry. The Packers and Vikings are coming.

CHICAGO — This was never going to be easy, this business of winning the NFC North. It was never a forgone conclusion, even when the Detroit Lions were rolling, and the Minnesota Vikings began running out of magic.

Minnesota isn’t out of the race yet for the North. The math is the math, and Minnesota's 3-0 (yes, really) victory Sunday moved them within two games of the Lions. But the team with momentum? Passing the eye test? That would be the Green Bay Packers, who play the woeful Giants tonight with the chance to also move to 7-6.

That would also put them two games behind the Lions with four to go and the easiest schedule left among the teams in the division. In other words, the Packers have a real shot at running the table and finishing at 11-6.

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If the Lions don’t go 2-2 to finish, Green Bay wins the North. Even if the Lions finish 2-2, the Packers can tie for the division and win on tiebreakers, depending on how the Lions fare against Minnesota.

This is almost too cruel to contemplate, but after watching the Lions slop around the field Sunday in Chicago — and considering how they’ve generally looked the last month or so — a 2-2 finish isn’t a ridiculous bet. Nor, for that matter, is a 1-3 close.

Too negative? Nah, just realistic.

As Dan Campbell said after his Lions lost, 28-13 at Soldier Field, “there's not going to be anything easy about (these games). That's not the league. The point is we’ve got to win … just win.”

Next up come the Denver Broncos on Saturday night at Ford Field. They've won six of seven and knocked off good teams during the stretch, including the L.A. Chargers on Sunday. They’re not out of their division race, just two games behind Kansas City in the AFC West.

They’ll be charged up and looking to take the ball away from an offense that has been turnover-prone — the Broncos lead the league in creating fumbles and rank high in turnover differential, too. This won’t be the cakewalk it looked to be when we looked at the schedule six weeks ago.

Just like Chicago wasn’t Sunday. Or Green Bay wasn’t on Thanksgiving.

The Lions don’t play either again, but they are both young teams with talent and quarterbacks starting to find themselves. The Bears are too far back to worry about in the race for the division. The Packers are not.

Yes, it’s hard to win eight in a row, even when a team starts feeling it, and that's what the Packers would have to do to get to 11-6; they have three straight wins entering their game against the Giants on Monday night.

Still, it’s possible.

After the Giants, Green Bay hosts Tampa Bay, travels to Carolina, travels to Minnesota, and hosts Chicago. This would’ve seemed ridiculous six weeks ago, but the Bears will be the Packers’ stiffest test.

Which means the Lions really need to beat Denver. Lose to the Broncos and it gets dicey — quick.

Next up will be Minnesota, and though the Vikings may not be the story they were a few weeks ago when Kirk Cousins replacement Josh Dobbs was making miracle plays — he was benched against Las Vegas on Sunday — the Vikings get one of the two games against the Lions at home.

And the chance to play them two weeks later at Ford Field.

Beating any team twice in three weeks in tough, even offensively challenged teams. It would behoove the Lions to make it happen, though.

For one, the Lions best chance at victory will come against Minnesota and beating them twice guarantees at least a tie in the NFC North if Green Bay runs the table. For another, it would keep the Lions' divisional record on pace with what the Packers would be if they finish 5-0, and divisional record is the second tiebreaker, after head-to-head record.

Perhaps we’re getting too far ahead. Maybe no one should be thinking about tiebreakers a month from now. But the weeks whiz by at this time of year — Week 18 gets here in a hurry.

The Lions understand this, and know they have to reset and refocus to navigate a tricky schedule. They don’t want to put themselves in a spot where they have to win at Dallas on a Saturday night — New Year’s Eve eve. The Cowboys are rolling. The Lions need to make progress elsewhere.

That starts, as Jared Goff said, by looking in the mirror. Sunday’s loss to the Bears, he said, “was a reality check.”

And?

“A little adversity isn’t the worst thing in the world at this point in the year,” he said.

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No, it’s not. Not for a team trying to regain its footing, and its swagger, as John Cominksy called it.

"I feel like we kind of lost our swagger and our confidence," said the defensive lineman, who had a sack and two QB hits Sunday. "When we play with confidence, guys are loose. That's when we were playing our best ball. (We’ve got to) get that swagger and confidence back.”

Truthfully, it has been a while since these Lions have played with the kind of swagger Cominsky describes, especially on defense. And while Justin Fields gouged their defense at times Sunday, the Lions discovered a touch of their swagger to slow him.

This may sound silly or impertinent, but the defense had moments against Chicago. A few of them, actually. It was the offense that didn’t hold up its end.

Campbell called it a lack of discipline and focus and pointed to more turnovers. It’s been a recent pattern.

“I’m not in panic mode,” he said. “I’m not losing confidence. “We've got four to go here. All we’ve got to do is get our discipline back and continue to fight like we fight.”

They’ll need every bit of that fight to get through Denver and give themselves the chance to clinch the division without having to knock off a red-hot Cowboys team in Dallas. They’ll need that fight — and focus — to keep from getting shut out again in the second half.

What’s left of the schedule isn’t overwhelming, but it isn’t the butter cake finish it looked like earlier this fall. Life changes fast in the NFL. A team that appears finished before the leaves turn can get on a roll after they fall.

And vice versa.

After their second loss in three games, the Lions are trying to keep that from happening to them. They still believe. And they should. They’ve been one of the best stories in the game for a while, and for good reason.

They just don’t have the margin for error. They can’t survive false starts even occasionally, because the entire system is based on a delicate balance.

That balance is a testament to the coaching staff and the players getting the most out of themselves. On Sunday, they did not, and it leads to questions.

“I know that everybody’s trying to grasp straws like, What are we? What is this?' ” Campbell said.

But?

“I know exactly what we are,” he said. “We're a team that’ll fight, and we’ve got to do things right. Any little mistake, it throws us off. That's just the type of team we are. But we got plenty here. (If) we do things right, we’re pretty damn good.”

They’ve done things right for most of the season. One more push and they’ll do something no Lions team has done in 30 years — win their division. It won’t be easy.

Would you have it any other way?

Contact Shawn Windsor: 313-222-6487 or swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: NFC North title for Detroit Lions far from foregone conclusion