Bears win messy one over Lions

Bears win messy one over Lions
The folks at the Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio won’t be calling to ask for a tape of the messy Chicago Bears’ 24-20 win over the Lions for display purposes, but, for the Bears, it’s just one more brick in the wall. Sedrick Ellis Jersey
And, for the Lions, it’s just business as usual as they lost their 19th consecutive NFC North regular-season game to fall to 2-10 on the season. This, in spite of Detroit’s Nate Burleson’s outrageous guarantee of a victory before the game.
At 9-3, the Bears sit atop the division, a game clear of the pursuing Packers. With a couple of plays at crucial moments and maybe an official’s call, the Lions could have won the game. They had Bears QB Jay Cutler running for his life all afternoon and also had good field position to stick a fork in Chicago in the second half, but they couldn’t deliver. Sedrick Ellis Jersey
You may remember that the Lions nearly beat the Bears in Chicago in Week 1 when Calvin Johnson laid the ball on the ground after he thought he had scored to win the game, only to have the officials declare he had not completed the play.
Yesterday, the Bears got another semi-gift when Detroit’s Ndamukong Suh, in pursuit of Cutler from behind, brought an arm down on the QB’s shoulder pad. When Cutler went to the ground, referee Ed Hochuli flagged Suh for unnecessary roughness, giving the Bears a first down at the Detroit seven-yard line.
Suh maintained he was just trying to knock the ball out.
“I was just going out there to make a play, get the ball out,” Suh said. “Obviously, (Cutler) broke a tackle, I had a great angle to make a play ... That’s what I went after.” Sedrick Ellis Jersey
Hochuli says protecting the quarterback didn’t factor in his decision to assess Suh a personal foul for hitting Cutler.
“Quarterbacks receive more protection (from officials), but in that situation (Suh’s hit was) an unnecessary blow,” Hochuli said. “A non-football act as the runner was going to the ground.”
Shortly thereafter, Cutler hooked up with Brandon Manumaleuna for the game-winning touchdown. It’s tough to say that the Suh penalty made all that much difference to the outcome since Chicago was already driving, but if it makes the Lions feel better, hey, go for it.
Those sour grapes aside, the Lions had plenty of opportunities to do the job themselves. Early in the third quarter they had a first down at the Chicago nine yard line but couldn’t move it, settling for a field goal. Sedrick Ellis Jersey
“Penalties kill us,” Johnson said. “We’ve seen it all season. Everybody’s tired of it, but until we stop (committing penalties), we’ll continue to have the same problems.”
After a lousy first half, in which they allowed 17 points and 250 yards, and got a serious tongue-lashing from coach Lovie Smith, the Chicago defence came back to hold Detroit to three points and 49 net second-half yards. Sedrick Ellis Jersey
“He was hot — not at everybody,” linebacker Lance Briggs said. “Not with the offence, special teams. But defensively that’s not characteristic of us that first half.”
“We didn’t tackle the first half, we didn’t read our keys, we didn’t make plays,” linebacker Brian Urlacher said. “The second half we did what we do, we got after the quarterback and stopped the run.”
Unless something extraordinary happens in the next month, it looks as if the NFC North title will go right down to the wire on the final weekend of the season on the second day of January, when the Bears go to the frozen tundra to face the Packers
In between, the Bears play New England, Minnesota and New York Giants. The Packers play Detroit, New England and those same Giants.
Luck of the drawSedrick Ellis Jersey
In the Andrew Luck sweepstakes, the Lions, Bengals and Bills held their ground, and now all sit at 2-10. The Carolina Panthers, after an early spurt against the Seattle Seahawks, came to their senses in the second half and gave up 21 third-quarter points to maintain the lead at 1-11.
Luck, the Stanford University quarterback, is the consensus No. 1 pick in the 2011 draft and could be a franchise-maker for the lucky (unlucky?) team that gets to call his name. The Lions already have a commitment to Drew Stafford as their QB, but the other three contenders would no doubt be chasing Luck.
Magical Brees
If Drew Brees ever gets tired of being a Super Bowl winning quarterback, he might take his act as an illusionist to Vegas.
Sunday, he got the Bengals — or at least one of them — to buy the oldest trick in the book to set up the game-winning touchdown in New Orleans’ 34-30 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals.
We take you now to the final minute of regulation. Bengals lead by three but the Saints have driven deep into Cincinnati territory where the drive has stalled. Fourth down, two yards to go for a first down at the Bengals seven-yard line. Sedrick Ellis Jersey
Instead of lining up to kick the field goal, the Saints lined up their offence and Brees did everything he could think of to make them believe he was going to snap the ball, even though all he wanted to do was get somebody to jump offside. If they didn’t jump, the Saints would take the five-yard penalty and kick the game-tying field goal.
As the seconds ticked down and the tension built, Cincinnati lineman Pat Sims did exactly that. He jumped off side to give New Orleans a first down. On the next play, Brees connected with Marques Colston on the game-winning TD.
“What is that guy doing?” said New Orleans lineman Sedrick Ellis Jersey. “You have to be smarter than that.”