BOX SCORE

CHICAGO — The Bears entered Sunday’s regular-season finale with only NFL playoff seeding on the line. They’d already secured a spot with the NFC North title.

Last week’s loss to the San Francisco 49ers left the NFC’s No. 2 seed up for grabs, though, with the Bears and Philadelphia Eagles both eligible to claim it. A Bears win or an Eagles loss would do the trick for Chicago, which preferred to earn it with a win in its regular-season finale.

Bears head coach Ben Johnson didn’t even entertain resting his starters, as Eagles coach Nick Sirianni did in their Week 18 game against the Washington Commanders. That decision to go for higher seed over rest bore fruit for Chicago but not directly.

The Bears fell to the Detroit Lions 19-16 on Sunday at Soldier Field. But the Commanders did Chicago a solid, beating the Eagles 24-17 to give the Bears the coveted No. 2 seed through the back door.

That means the Bears will play the No. 7 Green Bay Packers for a third time this season in their playoff opener. With a win, Chicago also would have another home game, against either the Eagles, Carolina Panthers or Los Angeles Rams in the divisional playoff round.

Here are three things we learned about the Bears in the Week 18 contest, as they finished the regular season 11-6:

Sleepwalking stopped late

As we’ve discussed, Sunday’s game had some high stakes, with the No. 2 seed guaranteeing the Bears at least two playoff games at Soldier Field — a huge advantage considering the crowd noise and unfavorable Chicago weather.

The Bears, however, didn’t play with the urgency required to beat a talented yet troubled Lions team that already was out of playoff contention. The offense was an absolute mess through three quarters. The defense consistently allowed long drives, with red-zone stops the team’s only saving grace.

Those turned out to be massively important, especially when the offense cranked up in the fourth quarter. The Bears scored 16 unanswered points, on two Caleb Williams touchdown passes and two 2-point conversions.

Williams’ best play came on this TD pass to Colston Loveland, as Chicago tied the score.

Kevin Byard III’s NFL-leading seventh interception of the season deep in Bears territory with 2:23 left killed one Lions go-ahead attempt but not the second one. Chicago punted, and Jared Goff led a two-minute drive that ended with Jake Bates’ decisive 42-yard field goal at the gun.

Williams sets franchise passing record

Williams had a realistic shot to become the first Bears quarterback to reach the 4,000-passing yard mark in a season. He needed 270 yards to do it.

That seemed less than likely with how the first half went, with Chicago held scoreless. Besting Erik Kramer’s single-season franchise mark of 3,838 yards, set in 1995, was more doable.

Williams, who entered Sunday with 3,730 passing yards, struggled to get much of anything going. Drops also were a problem for a completely disjointed passing game, but starting the game just 159 yards away from the record made the feat seem easy to accomplish.

Williams secured it on a 25-yard TD pass to Jahdae Walker in the fourth quarter, and it was a thing of beauty.

Williams finished the season with 3,942 passing yards, with 27 TDs and seven interceptions. He now has a career interception percentage of just 1.1, the best by any QB with at least 1,000 pass attempts in NFL history, per the Bears.

Williams also led a offense that finished with just 11 giveaways, the fewest by any NFL team and the fewest in a season by the Bears since at least 1941.

Defense proves red-zone tough

The Bears’ defense gave up way too many yards two weeks against the Packers, even without Jordan Love. 49ers QB Brock Purdy torched the unit in Chicago’s loss to San Francisco.

Goff and Amon-Ra St. Brown did the same thing for Detroit in Week 18. Goff completed 27 of 42 passes for 331 yards and one TD, and St. Brown caught 11 balls on 15 targets for 139 yards.

That’s a bad sign for a Bears defense that led the NFL in takeaways (33) and interceptions (23) this season but is trending in the wrong direction at the wrong time. The takeaways haven’t necessarily dried up, but the rate of turnovers never was sustainable, creating issues when they don’t show up on the stat sheet.

Takeaways are harder to earn against playoff-worthy teams, meaning the amount of explosive plays and long drives will create issues starting next week. Coordinator Dennis Allen will not reinvent the wheel in a short amount of time, so the players available must be more technically sound for the Bears to achieve playoff success. If that doesn’t happen, one-and-done is a real possibility.  

Being tough in the red zone, however, can make up for many ills. The Bears were really bad in that area against the 49ers, but they were excellent versus the Lions, allowing only one touchdown in four Detroit trips inside the 20.