Eberflus on his first winning streak with Bears: "It's a big deal" |
CHICAGO - For the first time since Matt Eberflus became the head coach, the Bears have won two games in a row. Further, both of those games were division games, Eberflus’ first two division victories since coming to Chicago. Getting this two-game win streak is a small thing for a lot of teams.
But for the Bears, this is incredibly important for their future and something Eberflus states was a long time coming. “I think it’s a big deal. I think it’s a long time coming. You beat two in a row, and it’s two division opponents, which is big, and the guys are super excited,” Eberflus said. “But, we could feel this coming. (Improvement) was happening over time and I just kept telling them, ‘If you keep doing right, it’s going to be right, and good things are going to happen,’ and two most important things is the ball and fourth-quarter finish.” The play from quarterback Justin Fields was essential. He finished the game with 223 passing yards, a passing touchdown, 58 rushing yards, and a rushing touchdown. Thus, it was his first game with both a rushing and passing touchdown since week two against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. However, the difference was that in that game, Fields had two interceptions, while Chicago did not have a single turnover in this game against the Lions. A critical play to give Chicago a 19-13 lead was on fourth and 13 when the Bears were trying to get the Lions to jump offside. Using Fields’ cadence, they were able to get the free play which resulted in a 39-yard receiving touchdown from DJ Moore. That was his second touchdown of the game, as he had a rushing touchdown on the opening drive. This decision-making Fields made on that play to go to Moore on that play shows his development in recognizing that Moore was one-on-one. “You have a couple of options off that when they jump,” Eberflus said. “One of them is you go all go, and that’s what we did, and DJ’s hard to cover and he’s hard to cover when you got a guy over top of him or just one guy on him like that. So, really good throw, really good catch, and really good reaction.” Defensively, this was yet another game with multiple turnovers. Detroit was one for five on fourth down, making four turnovers on downs, in addition to the two interceptions from Lions quarterback Jared Goff, as well as a fumble recovery. Second-year safety Jaquan Brisker, who forced the fumble, had a total of 17 tackles in this game, the most out of any Bears player in franchise history. Edge rusher Montez Sweat also made his presence known with constant pressure in the backfield and a sack. With Chicago playing better on both sides of the ball, they are still in contention for the playoffs with six teams, including the Bears, sitting with five or six wins. Currently, the Green Bay Packers, at 6-6, hold the No. 7 spot in the NFC; thus, it would certainly help with the playoff push if the New York Giants were to upset the Packers. They would need a lot of things to go their way in order to make the playoffs. However, with their second straight win, if they can keep the momentum going, it is still possible. Nonetheless, Eberflus is taking every week the same as every game offers something that can be learned and improved upon. “It’s (an) opportunity for us to put our best foot forward and be able to stay the course and be able to keep coming together and keep executing at a higher rate and there’s a lot of things out there that we can learn from, and so, we’re going to take the same mindset,” Eberflus said. “We’re going to look at the tape and we’re doing to try to make sure we look at it the right way. It’s not all rose-colored glasses because you won the game. That’s not it. You have to learn from this game and get better.”
