Bears News: Eberflus updates Jenkins injury, preparing to face Jaguars in London |
CHICAGO - In their 36-10 victory against the Carolina Panthers, the Chicago Bears got their largest margin of victory since head coach Matt Eberflus became the head coach. In fact, it was their largest win since the final game of the 2021 season when Chicago defeated the New York Giants 29-3.
A large part of this victory was having the offense go no-huddle. “I thought the no-huddle and doing the stuff with tempo was good,” Eberflus said. “I thought that gave us a little bit of juice there, and even though you’re not snapping the ball right away, you can always assess what the defense is doing there. So, I thought that was good.” It seems that rookie quarterback Caleb Williams is more comfortable in a no-huddle operation. He certainly appeared comfortable when playing against the Panthers defense, putting up 304 passing yards and two touchdowns. Even the wind did not stop Williams, even though it did impact the game, including when punter Tory Taylor came out. His longest punt was only 49 yards in that game; his season-long is 66 yards. “You want to see (Williams) drive it through the wind for sure, as the wind was swirling yesterday. It was a little bit different than normal coming out of the northwest. So, it was good to see that we operated the way we did in the quarters that we wanted to operate, so the wind was going in one direction for sure, and you could see that in the kicking game. You could tell when Tory was punting one way, it was difficult to punt down there, and when it was the other way, it was a little bit easier,” Eberflus said. “Caleb’s got a very strong arm. He can cut through the wind and again, you got to know which way it’s blowing to make sure you understand where it’s going to go when you throw it.” On the injury front, Chicago is doing relatively well compared to other teams. However, there is still some concern for guard Teven Jenkins, who exited the game with an ankle injury. Eberflus did not provide much of an update when speaking to the media on Monday, simply saying, “We’ll see where it is as we go through the week.” Defensively, the Bears defense continued to dominate. Second-year defensive lineman Gervon Dexter leads the team in sacks with four; he is in the top 20 in the NFL in sacks after the first five weeks. Defensive lineman Darrell Taylor and edge rusher Montez Sweat are tied for second on the team in sacks with two. So far, ten players have at least 0.5 sacks. Eberflus attributes this success to the job defensive line coach Travis Smith has done with rotating players. “The rotations’ been great. So, keeping guys fresh and really platooning those guys through there,” Eberflus said. “I think Travis has done a really good job of that during the course of the game, and you have your guys fresh in the fourth quarter, fresh on third down, to make sure they can operate and be at a good level there in terms of energy level, in terms of rushing the passer.” For the first time this season, this Chicago defense will face a quarterback drafted No. 1 overall as they travel to London to face Trevor Lawrence and the Jacksonville Jaguars this coming Sunday (8:30 a.m. / NFL Network). Jacksonville is coming off their first win of the season. “Trevor’s a good player. He’s experienced. He’s got a good cast of receivers,” Eberflus said. “He’s got a good offensive line in front of him, and they really got their run game going this year as opposed to last year. They really got good numbers right now. So, it’ll be a big challenge for us. He just does a really good job at distributing the ball … They’ve been efficient, and they looked good (Sunday) for sure.” Right facing the Jaguars in London, the Bears will have their bye week. Electing to have the bye week after playing in the London game is becoming more common. Given the rest of Chicago’s schedule, Eberflus said he thought it worked out well to have the bye after the London game as they will also have a mini-bye following their Thanksgiving matchup against the Detroit Lions on Thurs. Nov. 28 (11:30 a.m. / CBS). “I just think it’s a good time. Our schedule’s good because we got this first six, and then you got another six, and then you got a little mini-bye there,” Eberflus said. “So, I think it fits out well for us in terms of the timing of the season and it’s going to be good for us.”
