With less than 20 seconds remaining in Sunday night's Rams-Bears clash, Caleb Williams successfully connected on an impossible-seeming touchdown pass. Chicago's season has been all about improbable comebacks, but this was a new peak.
The Bears offense had been mostly stymied all day, and up to this point they'd turned the ball over twice while the Rams had held on tight all game. However, the defense had done just enough to keep it a one-score game, 17-10, when Williams got the ball at midfield for a two-minute drill. A few completions brought Chicago into the red zone on second-and-4. A few incompletions made it fourth down from the 14—one last chance to add to that list of jaw-dropping late-game plays that have helped so many Bears fans fall back in love with this team this year.
It started horrendously. Williams, facing pressure, ran straight backward until he was literally 25 yards behind the line of scrimmage. Anyone who watches football knows, or at least thinks they know, that absolutely nothing good can happen when a quarterback does this. I was rooting pretty hard for the Bears here, watching alongside my Chicago-native boyfriend, and it was at this point that I accepted the season was over. But I was early to that conclusion. Williams was fast enough to buy a second of space from his pursuers, and on the 40-yard line he turned back toward the end zone and lofted a pass into the unknown.
I often complain about not being able to see what a quarterback sees from the standard broadcast angle of a football game, which cuts off anything that's happening more than 10 or 15 yards away from the ball. For a sport that reigns as the No. 1 TV show in America, it's actually pretty incredible that the viewers are denied the crucial information of "where the receivers are downfield." But in this case, not having any idea what Williams was looking at when he let go of the ball made for a delightful reveal when the camera finally panned left. At the very last split-second before he hauled it in, everyone watching at home learned that Cole Kmet was open in the end zone. The Bears' tight end made a ridiculously simple catch, given all that came before it, and a whole fanbase (plus me) got to scream in unison at the tying touchdown. If I thought long enough and hard enough, I bet I would come up with a more wildly heroic play that I've seen somewhere before. But I don't have any interest in trying to rank this pass. Even this morning, knowing what happened next, I can't stop smiling as I watch and rewatch Williams escape disaster.
On the third possession of overtime, the Rams kicked a field goal to make it to the NFC title game, putting an end to the best Bears season in 15 years. Like any team that suffers a playoff loss, you can question what Chicago did wrong in the aftermath. Should the Bears have gone for two after Williams-to-Kmet delivered them six? What was DJ Moore doing when he seemingly gave up on his route as Williams threw his back-breaking third interception of the game in OT? And did Ben Johnson need to get a little trickier on a couple of those stalled Bears drives where they seemed too interested in running into the line for no gain?
Maybe. Because of the sum total of everything that happened on Sunday night, the Rams will face the Seahawks next weekend with a Super Bowl ticket on the line (as well as a chance to throw it in the face of everyone who tsk-tsked L.A.'s aggressive win-now moves when they won their last championship). The Bears, meanwhile, get seven months of nothing before they can start to try again. It'll be a long, long wait until their fans can cheer for their boys once more, and probably today a lot of Chicagoans are waking up with a bitter taste in their mouth from that last interception. But all through the spring and summer they'll have some memories no other city can claim: The blocked field goal for the win in Week 4. Colston Loveland bouncing off a would-be tackler as he ran to the end zone to beat the Bengals 47-42. Devin Duvernay's long kick return to set up a win over the Vikings. Williams scrambling for victory against the Giants. The first comeback against the Packers. The second comeback against the Packers. And that pass late in the fourth when all looked lost. It ultimately wasn't enough for the team to reach its goal. But it sure was something.
