Going into halftime, things looked bleak for the Chicago Bears. They’d fallen behind 17-0 in the waning minutes of the second quarter. Only a timely 67-yard kick return allowed them to put up a field goal to make it 17-3. The Tennessee Titans were doing pretty much whatever they wanted on offense. Head coach Matt Eberflus knew he had to do something. The first thing was slowing down the Titans’ ground attack, which had gouged the Bears for 112 yards to that point. How?
He noted that most of Tennessee’s big runs had come from bouncing the ball to the outside, where Tony Pollard’s speed was more dangerous. So, the goal for Eberflus was to take those away. To do this, he made an adjustment on the Bears’ defensive line. He had the defensive ends move out to what is called a Wide-9 formation, where the defensive ends play on the outside shoulders of the offensive tackles. This should allow them to bottle up the outside runs, forcing Titan backs to turn inside.
It worked to perfection.
Matt Eberflus completely blew up Tennessee’s game plan.
Once it became clear their running backs couldn’t bounce outside, things went south fast. None of their inside runs went anywhere. This forced the Titans to lean more on Will Levis throwing the ball, which, in turn, allowed the Bears to rush him. That led to sacks and, more importantly, turnovers. A strip-sack and a pick-six led to 10 crucial points that helped Chicago go from a 17-3 deficit to a 24-17 lead. Tennessee ran for only 28 yards in the second half. They never found an answer to the Bears’ alignment shift.
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For all the talk about how Matt Eberflus is nothing more than a motivator as a head coach, people still don’t understand how good he is at coordinating. There is a reason he had so much success with the Indianapolis Colts defense. There is a reason the Bears defense experienced a miraculous turnaround last season after a dismal start. Eberflus knows what he’s doing. The defense is in great hands with him. If Caleb Williams is the real deal, this team will be good.
Quite simply: Flus is a defensive genius. Who would have thought of such a change against RB Pollard? I’m just glad the Bears did not have to face RB Henry.
I agree with you, Byron. Honestly, anything Booker gives us is gravy in the early set of games, being a rookie.
We have an ascending team due to our current GM. It will not be perfect, but if you look at the roster, draft picks available, and cap numbers, we are in much better shape. We also have a solid culture, and we are bringing in guys that want to be a part of building a winner.
Being able to move Walker from the edge to the interior line during passing downs is a luxury the Bears got by obtaining Darrell Taylor. Sure, they have Booker, but it’s nice to have him as a depth piece in his rookie season and add some mass and experience. Hey, the Bears were just named with the number 1 pass rush. If they can stop the run, which we know they can this game can be won at the line of scrimmage on the defensive side of the ball. Bring in Tory and a good special team unit the Bears… Read more »
Dr M,
Not sure if Erik wants to give any credit to Eric Washington. Is Phil Snow still with the team? Maybe he made the suggestion. All that matters is, somebody made an adjustment at halftime to make things better for the Bears defensively. Im sure Waldron will make appropriate adjustments to the offense as needed.
It’s good to hear about successful halftime adjustments. But I doubt Erik knows whether it was Flus, DC Washington, or another defensive coach who initiated the move to the wide-9 alignment. I know that in his presser, Flus gave all the credit to the players, which is a savvy thing for the coach to do. One other irksome point about the article. “The Tennessee Titans were doing pretty much whatever they wanted on offense.” I disagree. At the beginning of the game, they weren’t doing squat. The first two drives for the Titans netted 0 first downs and 0 total… Read more »