GLENDALE, Ariz. — Jared Goff didn’t see him. Hey, it happens. Quarterbacks get baited.

And so, when Goff tried to dump the ball over the middle to Brock Wright midway through the third quarter Sunday afternoon at State Farm Stadium and missed Dennis Gardeck lurking just to Wright’s left, he made a play every quarterback in the NFL makes — Patrick Mahomes throws interceptions, after all.

But then this isn’t meant to be a defense of Goff — he played mostly efficiently against Arizona, but he also has four picks in three games, a ratio he’d tell you needs to change.

Again, though, this isn’t about Goff. He’s the context for this story. The backdrop.

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This is about the defense.

And without his interception, the Lions’ defense doesn’t get the chance to make a statement, and that statement is this:

We are good. And getting better.

Also, this:

We are the story of the Lions season to this point.

No individual defender would say that last part, but some of their teammates on offense might ... and did. Here was Taylor Decker:

“They've been lights-out. I think it’s a credit to Brad (Holmes) and Dan (Campbell) and their evaluation process and who they are going to bring in. They are playing really confident. I mean we saw that in camp when they were playing against us.”

They talked about it back then, too. That Aidan Hutchinson looked different. That Alim McNeill looked quicker. That Marcus Davenport was a “man.” That the secondary was, to quote Jared Goff, stickier.

That played out in the second half against the Cardinals, when the back end helped the front end to keep Arizona out of the end zone. The Cardinals got the ball seven times after halftime. They scored a field goal. The other six drives went like this:

Five plays, interception; three plays, punt; four plays, turnover on downs; three plays, punt; five plays, turnover on downs; five plays, punt.

“We know,” Decker said, “that the defense is going to go out there and almost every time they are going to get (us) the ball back.”

And?

“I’m not a coverage expert, but the coverage in the second half was pretty incredible.”

That's the biggest difference between last season’s defense and this season’s defense, at least so far. The cornerbacks can cover. Also, playmaking at safety is getting better.

Kerby Joseph is one reason. Brian Branch is the other.

Joseph is in his third year. He’s a ball hawk. His “hawking” is improving.

“He is quietly getting better,” Campbell said.

Joseph got his second pick this season when he leapt in front of Marvin Harrison Jr. in the end zone early in the third quarter. The snag set the tone for the second half. And while Joseph has a reputation among some in the league as a borderline dirty player, he isn’t as violent (in the best football way) or as physical as his second-year counterpart at safety.

Every game it seems, Branch rushes in to thump somebody. Or chases down a receiver or running back on the boundary and greets them with glee. He breaks up passes and stuffs run lanes, and he is new to the position.

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As Campbell noted Sunday, the principal secondary players — Terrion Arnold and Carlton Davis III at corner, Joseph and Branch at safety, Amik Robertson in the slot — haven’t had many reps together, and didn’t get to work out the kinks much in camp because of injuries.

“The more they are able to play together the better they’re going to get,” he said. “They're just continuing to get better and better and better.”

The Cardinals scored 28 and 41 points in their first two games. The Lions allowed them 13 Sunday — partly by shutting down the run, but mostly by keeping Kyler Murray relatively contained.

Let’s get back to Goff for a moment. That pick he threw? Arizona took over at the Lions’ 33-yard line. Here’s what happened next:

Run for 6 yards. Run for 2. Run for 1. Run for no yards, on a designed run by Murray, who tried to get the edge and slip past the marker but couldn’t before Davis ran him down. Officials gave Arizona the first down. Campbell challenged and won.

That stop may have saved the game.

Mostly because Goff and the offense couldn’t put it away in the second half. Hey, that happens. And it will happen again as the offense tries to find consistency.

Three games in, the Lions' offense is averaging 18.6 points a game in regulation (they scored a touchdown in overtime against the Los Angeles Rams in the season opener). That is almost nine points less than the Lions' average output — 27.1 points — last season, when Ben Johnson oversaw a top-five offense.

Now, that could change, obviously, and I’d be surprised if it doesn’t. Until it does, however, the Lions will stay in games because of their defense.

How about a few more numbers?

Like this one: As of Sunday night, the Lions had a top-eight scoring defense, a top-10 passing defense, and a top-five rushing defense. Which means, you guessed it, the Lions have a top-10 defense.

When was the last time the Lions could say that?

A long time is the answer. And certainly not since before Matt Patricia arrived.

Here’s another way to think about the level of defense we’ve seen the first three weeks of the season. If the Lions looked like this last year, they’d have gotten to the Super Bowl.

Because getting to the Super Bowl needn’t require an all-time squad of stoppers. Just a couple of difference-makers and a bunch of pros working in concert will keep a team in the game in this NFL.

After another good performance, it looks like the Lions have exactly this combination.

“Our defense is playing really well right now,” said Goff. “That's three straight games ... (they) made some plays for us and picked up us when we needed it.”

Contact Shawn Windsor: swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Lions defense making a statement already