SEATTLE — The Bears declared their Super Bowl intentions to the rest of the NFL last week. On Monday night, they backed them up.
With every grinding, physical offensive possession and bone-jarring tackle — and, yes, even a blocked field goal — they showed they deserve to be considered one of the best teams in the league, smothering the defending champion Sea-hawks in a 34-17 victory that was impressive as much for their nasty style of play as it was the final score.
“We’re also a force to be reckoned with,” quarterback Caleb Williams said.
Four days after trading for Titans all-world defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons, the Bears faced their toughest challenge of the season — a prime-time road game in a stadium where teams not named the 49ers had won just once in the last two years. They traded punches with the Sea-hawks and, in doing so, sent a message that the combination of coach Ben Johnson, Williams and a smashmouth, creative defense will spend the second half of the season in contention for supremacy in the NFC North and perhaps the conference.
Johnson wasn’t ready to go there yet.
“We didn’t come here to make a statement,” he said. “We’re still building.”
Nonetheless, they did something that no one had done to the Seahawks in 27 games: They scored on the first drive. And what a drive it was: 17 plays for 80 grueling yards over a whopping 8 minutes, 32 seconds. Wide receiver Luther Burden’s fourth catch of the drive was his shortest — a 1-yard touchdown pass from Williams, who wasn’t as flashy as he had been in wins against the Falcons and Patriots the previous two weeks but remained composed as Lumen Field rattled with line-of-scrimmage noise.
“I thought our guys came out with their hair on fire,” Johnson said. “And I thought that carried over for 60 minutes.”
Williams went 24-for-34 for 247 yards and one touchdown for a 101.0 passer rating. In the first half alone, he went 17-for-25 for 165 yards and had a 99.6 passer rating. By the middle of the third quarter, he had become the first QB all year to throw for at least 200 yards against the Seahawks. The Bears racked up 208 yards in the first half against a defense that had allowed 234 per game this season.
“He took care of the football,” Johnson said. “I thought he did a lot of really good things throughout.”
Williams followed perhaps his biggest mistake of the game with an easy, effective pass. After taking a delay-of-game penalty on third-and-four at the Seahawks’ 39-yard line while ahead by three points early in the fourth quarter, he threw a screen pass to the right. Wide receiver Kalif Raymond took it 39 yards. Running back D’Andre Swift then ran to the right pylon for a five-yard touchdown on the next play — his second of the game — to make it 27-17.
Defensive tackle James Lynch sealed the game with an interception off a tipped pass by defensive end Austin Booker, giving the Bears the ball at the Seahawks’ 6 with about six minutes to play. Swift scored his third touchdown, a five-yarder, to account for the final score.
Simmons, for whom the Bears sent the Titans two first-round picks and a fourth-rounder last week, made his presence known early, sacking quarterback Sam Darnold in the first quarter. His new teammates matched his intensity, allowing only three first downs on the five possessions that preceded the Seahawks’ touchdown-scoring drive. Simmons led the Bears with five tackles in the first half, a rare feat for a defensive tackle.
Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen was creative with how he used Simmons, even lining him up at defensive end on certain passing downs. He wasn’t on the field when the Seahawks scored their first touchdown with 30 seconds left in the half, with superstar wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba beating cornerback Tyrique Stevenson on a deep ball down the left sideline for the 43-yard score. Smith-Njigba, who entered the weekend as the NFL’s leader in receiving yards, had four catches for 92 yards in the first half.
The Bears traded field goals late in the first half. Cairo Santos made his 38-yarder after the Bears marched downfield with relative ease. Wide receiver Rome Odunze caught an 18-yard pass and, later, a 24-yarder on an end-around when Williams played receiver.
Late in the third quarter, the Bears were saved from yet another star turn by Smith-Njigba when he was called for offensive pass interference for the first time in his career. Booker then blocked Jason Myers’ kick, which would have cut the Bears’ lead to eight points if it had gone through the uprights.
Bears tight end Colston Loveland fumbled after catching a screen pass on third-and-long early in the fourth quarter. Later, safety Cam Lewis intercepted a pass in the end zone, but cornerback Clark Phillips was flagged. Darnold found wide receiver Cooper Kupp for a seven-yard touchdown pass, then further cut the Bears’ lead with a two-point conversion pass.
“We wouldn’t have this belief without the defense, [and] we wouldn’t have this defense without the special teams,” Williams said.