Chicago Bears’ Week 9 win was sealed in a way that can make Bears fans smile and it makes Matt Eberflus look even more foolish
Chicago’s Hail Mary coverage in Week 9 looked a little different under Dennis Allen.
The Chicago Bears continue to win ugly, improving to 5-3 on the season after avoiding disaster against the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday.
As always, there’s a lot to clean up after this game for all three sides of the ball. Offensively, the Bears dominated on the ground with rookie Kyle Monangai and continued to go punch for punch for all four quarters. Defensively, the unit struggled against veteran quarterback Joe Flacco, but had three takeaways that decided it.
The final takeaway came on Flacco’s Hail Mary attempt on the final play of the game, his second interception. Chicago fans had some flashbacks when Flacco stepped back to pass with four seconds remaining, thinking back to last season’s Hail Mary blunder against the Washington Commanders. But there’s a clear reason why the outcome was different on Sunday.
Dennis Allen’s aggressive call on the final play helped close out the win for Chicago
When the Bengals snapped the ball and Flacco dropped back on the Hail Mary, defensive coordinator Dennis Allen dialed up the pressure with six players blitzing on the play, leaving only five players back defending the end zone. Flacco was rushed out of the pocket immediately and threw a short pass that was picked off at the 18-yard line.
Not sending pressure in the same situation last season was one of the heavily criticized calls former head coach Matt Eberflus made, something that was overlooked by Tyrique Stevenson’s antics with the crowd. Regardless, here’s what head coach Ben Johnson said after the win about the decision to send pressure on that particular play.
“I think teams have philosophies on that and each week’s a little bit different,” Johnson said after the game. “We felt pretty comfortable going into this week, and that being our game of attack.”
Now, let’s go back and see what Eberflus’ reasoning was for sending just three pass rushers with one spy and seven players in coverage on the Hail Mary attempt at the end of the Washington game.
“The most important thing is to just stay after (the quarterback),” Eberflus said about blitzing in the Washington Hail Mary situation in 2024. “But in terms of the extra rusher, you could certainly do that. But at that position of the field, we thought that was the right thing to do.”
Even after being fired, Eberflus continues to look foolish for some of the decisions he made in Chicago. The Bears and the fans should be thankful to have aggressive coaches like Johnson and Allen leading this team now.
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