Saints Defeat the Bears as Wims gets Suspended
03 November 2020
By: Paulina Vairo
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On a cold day at Soldier Field, Drew Brees and his New Orleans Saints faced Nick Foles and his Chicago Bears for a midday game in Chicago. Though the Saints are 4-2, they have struggled with injuries to key players, including star wide receiver Michael Thomas. The Bears on the other hand continue to struggle offensively, relying on their defense for most of the season to give them wins.
The first touchdown of the game did not come until the second quarter when Nick Foles threw a 24-yard pass to wide receiver Allen Robinson to give the Bears an early 10-3 lead. A 29-yard field goal by kicker Cairo Santos gave the Bears a 10-point lead by the two-minute warning in the second half.
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The Saints had an opportunity for one last drive at the end of the second half to see if they can add on any points before the half. It took Brees nine plays and 63 yards to set up tight end Jared Cook for a 16-yard touchdown catch to cut the Bears lead to just three points with three seconds left in the half.
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Brees ended the game with 31 completions, 280 passing yards, and two touchdown passes (Photo Credit: Celeste Sabin/Prime Time Sports Talk)
During the third quarter, Bears wide receiver Javon Wims threw two punches at Saints defensive back C.J Gardner-Johnson, defending his teammate Anthony Miller. Wims was immediately ejected from the game.
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Nick Foles struggled most of the game to find completions to his receivers. He only totaled 28 completions, 272 passing yards and only two touchdown passes and throwing one interception while being sacked five times. Drew Brees and his offense also struggled to get plays in with the strength of the Bears defense. Kicker Wil Lutz kicked a 27- and 39-yard field goal to give the Saints the lead 16-13 heading into the fourth quarter.
Brees was finally able to break the Bears defense up with a 20-yard pass to Taysom Hill to give the Saints a 10-point lead early in the fourth quarter. The Bears continue to use Foles as the quarterback even though he continued to struggle to get into the red zone. Foles was then able to get a 75-yard play going that resulted in a touchdown pass to wide receiver Darnell Mooney to put the Bears just three points short of the Saints 23-20.
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Bears kicker Santos sent the game to overtime with a 51-yard kick with 13 seconds left in the game. With both defenses solid all game, the game ended with Saints kicker Wil Lutz making a 35-yard field goal to give the Saints the victory 26-23.
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After the game Bears head coach Matt Nagy addressed the incident with Wims. Though he missed when Wims threw the punches, he made it very clear that his actions were unacceptable and should not be allowed in the game. “I did not see it. I totally missed it. What I did hear was it looked like, which is completely unacceptable. We’ve talked to him and told him that that’s not how things go here…There’s no place in our game for that” said Nagy according to Yahoo Sports.
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C.J after the game spoke to reporters regarding the incident, denying that he ever spit on Wims and that the incident was all on him. “It ain’t got nothing to do with me. If he’s acting out, that’s on him,” C.J said to ESPN. “It wasn’t no incident. We won the game. I mean, everybody, it’s a lot of he said, he said. Ain’t nothing happened. Nobody got spit on. Shouldn’t be nowhere near the field of play when the game’s going on. So I ain’t answering no more questions about that.”
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Though the reasoning for the punches thrown are a bit unclear besides the fact that he was defending his teammate, Wims will be suspended for two games for the incident.
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The struggling 5-3 Bears will head to Nissan Stadium to face the Tennessee Titans, who are coming off a hard loss against the Cincinnati Bengals. The Saints will head to Tampa where they will face the flaming hot Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in a NFC South showdown on Sunday night football.
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(Article can also be seen on https://thegamehaus.com/nfl/saints-defeat-the-bears-as-wims-gets-suspended/2020/11/03/ )