WATCH LIVE: Lions vs. Buccaneers playoff preview: Madden 24 sim

Previewing the Detroit Lions vs. Tampa Bay Buccneers divisional round playoff matchup with a game of Madden 24.

The Detroit Lions face off against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on NBC for a spot in the NFC title game.

But some (read: nobody) believe the real game is being played on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. ET. That’s when our Pride of Detroit Madden 24 simulation will take place.

If you’ve never watched one of these simulations, we set up the lineups to match what we think they’ll look like on Sunday, pick out our favorite uniform combination, then let the computer control both teams, and see who Madden 24 believes will win the game. I host it live, providing live commentary to the game while also answering your questions about the Lions.

Early in the season, we ran into a pretty serious problem: Madden thought the Lions were absolute trash. In our first nine Madden sims of the season, the Lions lost eight of them. So midway through the season we went searching for help. We found a Discord community that created modifications to the game to make it more realistic. Here’s the crazy thing: it absolutely worked. When using the modification, the Madden simulations have been 100% accurate in five uses.

Here’s a look at the accuracy of our Madden sims this year:

So who will be the winner on Sunday? Tune into our Saturday morning simulation—which will be using the mod again this week—to find out!

Here’s how you can watch and be a part of the live show:

What: Lions vs. Buccaneers Divisional Round playoffs Madden 24 simulation
When: 10 a.m. ET — Saturday, January 20
Where: Twitch.tv/prideofdetroit or YouTube.com/@Prideofdetroit (or embedded below)