CHICAGO — The Chicago Bears’ 19-play touchdown drive on the team’s first possession in the second half almost ended after the second play.

D’Andre Swift started the drive with an 11-yard run off the left side. Then Caleb Williams faked the handoff to Swift and attempted to hit his running back in the flat, but the pass was deflected and went right into the air. Three Cowboys defenders were in the vicinity, but the ball fell harmlessly to the ground.

Had the football deflected a little further, it would have likely been intercepted. But that wasn’t the case, and the drive instead provided a glimpse of what this Bears offense can do when each player commits as a single unit against a defense.

The touchdown drive in the Bears’ 31-14 victory over the Cowboys was a defining moment and a potential identity-establisher for head coach Ben Johnson’s team.

“A 19-play drive, that’s going to bring the dog out of everybody, you know what I mean?” Rome Odunze said after the game. “So for us to be able to go put those 19 plays out there and then touch the pain that tells me we got the right guys in here, and we got that dog mentality. We’ll continue to put that foot forward, but we adapt to any situation that we are in, and that situation we needed a 19-play drive.”

On the third play of the drive, Williams and Odunze failed to connect on a corner route as the pass sailed out of bounds, which set up a third-and-10. The drive looked bleak and destined to end before it really had even started. Then Williams completed back-to-back passes to DJ Moore for gains of 12 and 9 yards.

After that, the Bears ran the ball 11 straight times. Five players carried the football: Williams, Swift, Moore, Luther Burden III and Kyle Monangai.

The Bears slowly marched down the field and time ticked off the game clock. Two yards there. A 7-yard designed quarterback keeper. An end-around to Burden on third-and-4 that picked up seven yards. And the last run by Monangai lost eight yards after the rookie running back broke tackle after tackle until he was finally brought down.

Monangai caught a 4-yard pass on second-and-goal from the Dallas 15. Williams found Burden for another seven yards on third-and-goal. A decision needed to be made after 18 plays of moving down the field, but it wasn’t much of a thought for Johnson.

“I knew he was probably going to go for it,” right tackle Darnell Wright said after the game. “At least that’s what I thought.”

On the 19th play — a fourth-down attempt from the Cowboys’ 4-yard line — Williams dropped back to pass, climbed the pocket, moved right and found a wide-open Moore for the touchdown.

Moore played all 19 snaps on the drive and described it as “torture.” But like Wright, Moore noticed the Cowboys’ defenders slowing down as the Bears’ offense inched closer to the end zone.

The drive started on the Bears’ 24-yard line, and 10:03 remained in the third quarter. By the time the Bears had scored and moved the ball 76 yards later, there were nine seconds left in the quarter.

Odunze has been playing football since he was a kid, but he couldn’t recall if he had ever been a part of a drive like the one that started the third quarter.

“No, I don’t believe so,” Odunze said. “I don’t believe so at all ever in my career, probably since like little league, so that was awesome. That was a gritty, gritty drive, so it was great. We were able to knock some time off the clock and punch it in, so it was a good drive.”

Those 19 plays weren’t all positive, especially at the start. But the way the offense overcame and continued to the next rep is a sign of growth from a team that had struggled to handle adversity in the first two games. Think back to the blown 11-point lead in the fourth quarter against the Vikings. Or the second half against the Lions after Detroit scored a touchdown at the end of the second quarter.

On that 19-play touchdown drive, the offense simply moved on to the next play. Like a cornerback must do after they give up a reception. That’s a mindset the Bears can win with, and it proved to be true against the Cowboys at Soldier Field on Sunday.

“Listen, the first two weeks have not gone the way we wanted to,” Johnson said. “It’s early. We’ve got to get the issues fixed. I thought the guys were committed to that here this week, and we had a good week of preparation, and they came out and they played inspired football today.

“Good things happen when you’re playing hard, you’re playing physical and you’re playing for the guy next to you. I thought that’s what happened here today.”