The Bears almost beat the Lions last month in Detroit. On Sunday, the Bears finished the job in Chicago.
After the 28-13 win at Soldier Field, PFT spoke by phone with Bears defensive end Montez Sweat. How were the Bears able to hold Detroit’s supposedly high-flying offense to 13 points?
“We know they want to run the ball first,” Sweat said. “I mean, that’s really the first thing. We want to stop the run . . . [and] just really on third down, we don’t feel like a lot of teams can mess with us on third down.”
Did they do anything special to stop quarterback Jared Goff, who had two interceptions and fumbled a snap?
“I mean, we were just rushing him,” Sweat said. “No QB likes to get hit. We tagged him a couple of times, man. We just finished up at the end. But, yeah, no QB likes to get hit and we just let him know we were there.”
It’s an encouraging sign for the Bears. And it’s a borderline red alert for the Lions, especially with games coming up against quality defenses from Denver, Minnesota (twice), and Dallas.
Get to third down. Which could be a tactful way of saying, “If they have to rely on Jared Goff to move the chains, we’ll be fine.”
The Lions currently aren’t fine. While their nine wins make a playoff berth very likely, they’re going to have to earn their NFC North hats and T-shirts. And their streak of years without a playoff win likely will stretch to 32.
