The weather forecast for Minneapolis this weekend is cold.

Bitterly cold.

That’s OK. It’s nothing Brandon Fusco can’t handle.

Fusco, a starting guard for the Minnesota Vikings and a Seneca Valley High School and Slippery Rock University graduate, will be bidding for his first career NFL playoff win at 1 p.m. Sunday.

The Vikings play host to two-time defending NFC champion Seattle and the temperature that afternoon is scheduled to be 3 degrees.

Those are tough conditions in which to be slamming your body into one of the top defenses in pro football for three hours. That will be Fusco’s job on Sunday.

And if people can’t believe he can do it, he may prove them wrong. Again.

This guy has been doing that all of his football life.

Fusco didn’t even begin playing the game until his junior year in high school. The Raiders won two games during his two years as a starter.

A 240-pound lineman, major college programs weren’t interested in him. Slippery Rock was and it was there that he built himself into a 300-pound center who eventually won the Gene Upshaw Award as the best Division II lineman in the country.

Projected as a mid-round pick in the NFL Draft, Fusco was selected in the sixth-round by the Vikings. There was no guarantee he would even make the team.

He became a starting guard by his second season and now has started 50 consecutive games in the NFL. A torn pectoral muscle ended his 2014 season after just three games. Some wondered what the future held for him after that major injury.

Fusco has come back strong this season, starting all 16 Vikings games.

In this era of the pass-happy NFL, the heart of the Vikings’ attack remains running the ball. Adrian Peterson rushed for 1,485 yards and 11 touchdowns this year. Minnesota rushed for 18 touchdowns while Teddy Bridgewater threw for only 14.

At one point, few thought Peterson would ever carry the ball for the Vikings again. Still fewer believed the team could finish at .500 this year.

The Vikings wound up winning the NFC Central Division — on the road at rival Green Bay in the final game of the NFL regular season.

That victory gives Minnesota its frigid home game against Seattle, one of the hottest teams in football, an opponent with plenty of postseason success.

The Seahawks came into Minnesota and handed the Vikings a 38-7 whipping only a few short weeks ago.

So how many people give the Vikings much of a chance come Sunday?

Not many.

Underdogs again.

Brandon Fusco wouldn’t want it any other way.

John Enrietto is sports editor of the Butler Eagle