LAS VEGAS — Near the end of a game in which little about the Bears’ offense looked right and quarterback Caleb Williams hadn’t found his rhythm, coach Ben Johnson walked up to him on the sideline and told him exactly what he needed to hear.
“This is what you’re built for,” he said.
Williams proceeded to lead the offense down the field for the go-ahead touchdown, and it held up thanks to Josh Blackwell’s block of a potential winning field goal as the Bears escaped with a 25-24 victory Sunday over the Raiders.
They were miserable offensively until the end, but Williams came up big in what he called “a supremely tough game.” For all the disasters, and there were many, he got his chance when the Bears got the ball back with 6:45 left, trailing 24-19.
He went 4-for-5 for 42 yards and raced away from the Raiders’ relentless pass rush for 18 yards on two scrambles. Then running back D’Andre Swift, who struggled for every inch in the game, finished the 69-yard drive with a five-yard run to convert a third-and-four and a two-yard TD run to give the Bears the lead.
“Those are the moments you wish for,” Williams said. “It’s not a favored position: You’re away; you’re down; you’ve got to win the game. It’s a confidence-builder for us.”
While Williams is still trying to find his way, he often has risen to a new level when the game is at stake and has a career 96.1 passer rating in the fourth quarter.
He was far from perfect, and he’ll spend the next few days looking around vigilantly to make sure Raiders star defensive end Maxx Crosby isn’t chasing him anymore, but he recovered from a poor start and adjusted to the pressure in the pocket.
Williams was quicker getting the ball out throughout the second half, and it showed in his stats: Williams had a 47.2 passer rating in the first half and a 111.5 rating in the second. He finished 22-for-37 for 212 yards and a touchdown with an interception for a 73.3 rating.
It wasn’t the ideal leap after lighting up the Cowboys the previous week, when hardly anyone got near him in the pocket, but the ability to react and change course during a game is essential.
Williams also stayed poised even though the offense squandered incredible opportunities. The defense helped with four takeaways: two interceptions by safety Kevin Byard, one pick by cornerback Tyrique Stevenson and a fumble forced by defensive tackle Andrew Billings and linebacker Noah Sewell that was recovered by Stevenson.
.@KevinByard AGAIN! 🤯
📺: CBS pic.twitter.com/wuOTOEeJ4b
— Chicago Bears (@ChicagoBears) September 28, 2025
Between those four plays and another in which Las Vegas had to punt from its end zone, the Bears got the ball in Raiders territory five times and had only three field goals and a touchdown to show for it.
The most excruciating missed opportunity for Williams came in the first quarter when things already were going badly, then Crosby made an incredible interception in the red zone.
“There were moments in the game where I got frustrated, and the growth from that standpoint is not having bad body language or raising my temper too much,” Williams said. “The guys look at me, and they’re like, ‘OK, he’s composed, he’s still strong-willed that we’re going to come out here and score on the next drive.’ And maybe we don’t, but we’re going to get up, we’re going to fight, keep swinging.”
Composure left town when Blackwell blocked Raiders kicker Daniel Carlson’s 54-yard field goal with 33 seconds left. As Williams ran toward the tunnel, he jumped and yelled, “Yeah, let’s [expletive] go,” to the Bears fans in the north end zone.
The offense was a wreck before the frantic finish. It gained only 44 yards on its first 20 plays, Williams opened 2-for-11, Swift had only 25 rushing yards before picking up 13 on the last drive and Johnson was digging deep for answers.
He tried a version of his famous “Stumblebum” play in which Williams baited the defense by pretending to trip and even called a fake flea-flicker, hoping the Raiders would be overly concerned about it after the Bears used it for a long touchdown pass last week against the Cowboys.
Neither led to anything as Williams missed an open receiver on “Stumblebum” and Swift threw away his seven-yard gain on the fake flea-flicker with a face-mask penalty.
The only time everything truly clicked was at the end, when Johnson made the surprising call to give the ball to Swift twice inside the 7-yard line.
“In the moment, it’s just what your gut’s telling you,” Johnson said. “My gut was probably wrong a lot of the game, so it was good to see it come through.”
The game tested not only Williams’ resolve but Johnson’s. Beyond scheming ways to survive Crosby’s impact, he recognized he’s coaching a team with no track record of resilience.
When the Bears went into the locker room down 14-9 at halftime with only 90 yards of offense, he emphasized steadiness.
“Real calm,” Swift said. “He told everybody to relax.”
His postgame address was at the other end of the spectrum.
“That’s a [expletive] character win,” Johnson said in a video that circulated on social media. “That was two teams that were [expletive] desperate, but you know who wanted it a little bit more? The [expletive] Chicago Bears.”
Was he right? There’s no metric for that, but it’s hard to argue. This game could have sent the Bears into their bye week in crisis. But they stayed with it and did just enough right at the end to win a thriller.
