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Reacting to the Bears' 19-16 loss to Detroit | After The Whistle
The Bears fall into the playoffs 11-6 after the Lions beat them with a field goal at the buzzer. Tian Nguyen, Lou Canellis, Jim Miller and Pat the Designer all react to the game.
The Chicago Bears will never go quietly into the night. That's a given.
It shouldn't surprise anyone that Caleb Williams tossed two touchdown passes in the fourth quarter and had a chance to drive down the field and win the game on Sunday. Maybe it did, considering how flat and lifeless the Bears' offense looked in the first half.
Alas, the seventh comeback of the season engineered by The Iceman didn't come. Luckily, the Bears' have a chance to keep playing.
The postseason awaits.
Here are our takeaways from the Bears’ loss in the season finale.
The Bears don’t have long to move on from this loss
Last week, losing a shootout with the 49ers was only a cause for concern defensively.
This week, the offense was the letdown.
After dropping 38 points on San Francisco, the Bears mustered 16 on the final day of the regular season: two touchdowns and two 2-point conversions in the fourth quarter. It was the spot where Bears coach Ben Johnson was the most frustrated.
"I was not pleased with the offense at all today," he said after the game.
It’s hard to disagree. The Bears’ offense was anemic for three quarters before waking up late against the Lions.
Success in any other quarter, literally success anywhere else, and the Bears might have been playing to hold Detroit to a tying field goal instead of a game-winning one, or perhaps trying to prevent a game-winning touchdown.
Johnson’s offense has suffered from this in two of its last three games. Go back to the win over Green Bay, where it took a miracle to overcome a 10-point deficit in the final quarter. The Bears’ offense didn’t kick it into gear until after the 10-minute mark left in the game.
If there’s any part to wash from Sunday, that’s the looming factor.
It doesn't matter how the Bears do it. The Bears need to wash it away quickly.
"Everyone is disappointed," Johnson said. "Some teams, they rest their starters. We don't. We play football. We felt like it was really important that we were playing our best ball here today, and we didn't get that job done. We're quickly turning that page, and now we've got a home game coming on up, and there's a way to win this game, this next game, and that's what we're going to be solely focused on."
Grading the Chicago Bears in their regular-season finale against the Detroit Lions
Here's how we graded the Bears in their regular-season finale against the Lions.
The defense’s biggest concern heading into the playoffs
Late in the fourth quarter, with 40 seconds left in regulation, the FOX Sports camera panned to Johnson.
It looked like he muttered to himself, "Should’ve gone for it." The moment he was referring to was a fourth-and-five situation backed up at his own 31-yard line. Johnson mentioned it as such in the postgame discussion.
"We had three timeouts," Johnson said. "We felt like we were going to get the ball back."
The truth is, going for it would have been a much more viable option than what it might look like on paper because there would have been less time for Detroit to waste with a shorter field. The Lions’ offense was moving up and down against the Bears’ defense at will, thanks to the crossing routes that took full advantage of the Bears’ aggressive cornerbacks.
Jameson Williams and Amon-Ra St. Brown combined to finish with 213 receiving yards.
"We knew they were getting the ball," Bears safety Kevin Byard said. "I just don't think we executed the calls well enough. Obviously, got to look at the film, but I just don't think the execution was good enough on our part."
The final drive elicited one of the biggest concerns regarding the Bears’ defense heading into the postseason. Detroit stuck the Bears with one final crosser – a toss to St. Brown for 26 yards to the Bears’ 26-yard line – which set up the game-winning field goal.
All game, the Bears’ defense looked like a unit that was playing at about 60-70 percent of its health. That’s fair, considering it feels like plenty of the Bears’ defensive starters have spent time in injured reserve. In all: Jaylon Johnson, Kyler Gordon, Tyrique Stevenson, Nahshon Wright, Tremaine Edmunds, Noah Sewell, Grady Jarrett and TJ Edwards are a few of the names that have missed games this season.
Every team is battling injuries at this point of the season. The Bears looked like they were battling injuries on Sunday.
Colston Loveland is Caleb Williams’ top target at this point of the season
The Bears have plenty of mouths to feed.
From DJ Moore, all the way to Cole Kmet with everyone in between, it remains impressive that a rookie established himself as Caleb Williams’ favorite target when the dust settled.
With 10 receptions, 93 yards and a touchdown on Sunday, Loveland ended the regular season as the Bears’ top receiver on offense with 58 receptions for 713 yards and six touchdowns. All three of those numbers lead the Bears, although he’s tied with DJ Moore for six touchdowns on the season.
Loveland, the 10th overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, was looked at with a peculiar grade. Why select Loveland when All-American tight end Tyler Warren was there?
Loveland has done nothing but make people look silly for those kinds of takes. His one-yard touchdown to help tie the game in the fourth quarter was evidence of that, as was his ability to just being open when Williams needs him to be the most.
"He's done a great job since we've been together," Williams said after the game. "We've got to keep that going, got to keep growing, got to have this open communication that I always talk about to be able to have these moments where we can click and all the guys can click and come out victorious."
Chicago Bears QB Caleb Williams sets franchise passing record vs. Lions
For the first time since 1995, there's a new Chicago Bears quarterback at the top of the record books.
Next up: The NFL Playoffs
Green Bay.
Because of course it is.
Of course, it’s this season, with all its wacky and wild turns, that comes down to a Bears-Packers’ game where the stakes are as high as they’ve been since 2010.