The blank stare of Lovie Smith came out early today at Soldier Field as the Green Bay Packers took on the Chicago Bears. The opening drive consisted of Aaron Rodgers leading the Packers on a 7 play, 84 yard drive, capped off by a 1 yard touchdown run by the QB himself. The rest of the half was one sided and a horrid Bears offense tried and failed to move the ball against a great defensive effort by the Dom Capers led Packer defense. Jay Cutler couldn't hit sand in a desert and missed on several throws, including deep passes to Devin Hester and Johnny Knox that both could have put the Bears in the red zone, and after some crucial Bear's penalties the offense looked like my little brother's pee-wee football team, no offense Fuzz. After a slow start, the Bears defense seemed to buckle down and get some stops but the Packers scored again in the second quarter to make it a two touchdown game and the Bears went into halftime down 14 points, even though it felt like 35.
The Bears went into halftime with no momentum and came out with even less when after one series, a three and out, QB Jay Cutler was pulled from the game after a knee injury he sustained in the first half was bothering him. Backup Todd Collins came in, and not surprisingly did nothing. Collins played a few series and was pulled after a hard hit injured him, or maybe because he just sucks. The Chicago defense kept the Bears in the game and even got a red zone turnover on Brian Urlacher's interception, how Urlacher didn't score on the play is what I will be wondering for the rest of my life. Going into the 4th quarter the game was still 14-0.
The four quarter is when thing got interesting, 3rd string Bears QB Caleb Hanie led Chicago on an 8 play, 67 yard drive capped off by a 1 yard touchdown run by RB Chester Taylor. Hanie played extremely well, given the circumstances, and aside from 1 terrible interception; a pick 6 by B.J. Raji that gave the Packers a second 14 point lead, kept the Bears alive. Hanie bounced back and led the Bears to another score with a 35 yard touchdown pass to WR Earl Bennett to cut the lead to 7 with just under 5 minutes to play. The Bears defense got a much needed stop and the Packers were forced to punt, giving the Bears one last chance to tie with 2:53 left in the game. Hanie took the Bears 82 yards on 11 plays but threw an interception to seal the Bears fate. Hanie made Bears fans proud, coming in and playing as well as he did, but it just wasn't enough. The game was closer than it seemed like and a few plays that went either way will have Bears fans wondering "What if?" for a long time, for the Packers, they will be headed to Dallas to play in Super Bowl XLV.
Key Stat: The key statistic of this game has to be the Chicago Bears third down numbers. The Bears offense went 1-13 on third downs and thus, could not stay on the field, resulting in the Packers offense having the ball 10 more minutes then the Bears. The Packers could never really stomp the Bears out and made the game closer then it should have been, but at the end of the day, they are going to Dallas.
Game MVP: An argument could be made that Jay Cutler was the Packer's MVP, he left the game on a questionable knee injury and sent the Bears into a spiral for about a quarter until Caleb Hanie got in rhythm and made the game close. We don't know the full extent of Cutler's injury yet so to say he was soft for not playing would be wrong. For those reasons I have to give game MVP to Packer's rookie CB Sam Shields. Shields had two interceptions, including the one to close the game, and a forced fumble and with Aaron Rodgers not completely dominating there isn't an obvious choice for the award.
Goat of the Game: The goat of the game to me has to be Bear's head coach Lovie Smith. The Bears defense opened the game flat and let the Packers drive down the field for a score, taking the wind out of the stadium and giving the Packers offense loads of confidence. The Bears defense did rebound to Lovie's credit but along with not being able to motivate his defense, Lovie had Todd Collins ahead of Caleb Hanie on his depth chart. Why is this significant? Because NFL rules state that if you bring your 3rd string QB into the game, you cannot bring your 1st string back in. Had Lovie had Hanie ahead of Collins, Jay Cutler could have, if he were able to, come back into the game to give the Bears a better chance of winning.
Where do they go from here? The Packers will go to Dallas to take on the AFC champion for a shot at the Lombardi Trophy. The Bears have a lot of decisions to make but their first order of business has to be to resign head coach Lovie Smith, while he was my goat of the game he is a good head coach and there will not be a better option for the Bears this off season. As far as improving the roster goes, the Bears need to get younger on defense, upgrade at Safety and get a real, legitimate offensive weapon for Jay Cutler. That being said, the number one need for the Bears is to upgrade the offensive line, it all starts with protecting your franchise quarterback and the Bears weakness finally came back to haunt them, even if it took until the NFC Championship game to happen.
Written by: Matt Coan
No comments:
Post a Comment