Bears HC hits a milestone over a year in the making
The Chicago Bears will enter into their Week 13 bye week fresh off a 12-10 victory on Monday Night Football against the Minnesota Vikings. But the win means even more for Bears head coach Matt Eberflus. Week 12's win was the first divisional win by the Bears since 2021. The team previously went 0-9 against […]
The Chicago Bears will enter into their Week 13 bye week fresh off a 12-10 victory on Monday Night Football against the Minnesota Vikings.
But the win means even more for Bears head coach Matt Eberflus. Week 12's win was the first divisional win by the Bears since 2021. The team previously went 0-9 against NFC North opponents in the Eberflus era.
Since the Vikings entered into Week 12 with a 6-5 record, the win also marked the first under Eberflus against a team entering the matchup with a winning record. Chicago was previously 0-10 in such games since 2022.
It wasn't a pretty win for the Bears but it was a great morale booster for the team's locker room. It was a hard fought win for the Bears and helped show how resilient the team could truly be.
"I think it's very important, obviously our goal is to win the division," Eberflus said after the win. "But more importantly, I believe it's the way we finished. I think that's going to be more lasting. Going into these next ballgames, the proofs right there. We've been doing a lot of good things on offense, defense and kicking. It's good to win a tight one like this where we have some diversity at the end and had to pull through that diversity."
Bears quarterback Justin Fields also won his first career game against the Vikings (0-3 in head-to-head matchups prior to Week 12) and led his third game winning drive of his career.
Fields was 2-4 for 52 passing yards on the Bears final drive. Fields hit wide receiver DJ Moore for a 36-yard completion (the longest play of the entire game by either team) with less than one minute to go on 3rd-and-10. The drive was capped off with a go-ahead 30-yard field goal by Cairo Santos.
Santos scored all 12 of the Bears points in Week 12 while the team's defense forced four takeaways. The Bears have recorded seven interceptions in their last two games and now have the 3rd-most in the entire league in 2023.
It was a hard earned overall team win for the Bears, exactly the type of outcome the front office and ownership is looking to see in Chicago. The tide is slowing turning for the Bears with each passing week heading into the bye.
"You can feel it," Eberflus added. "The momentum keeps growing and growing with those guys and and they certainly are exciting to watch."
