The Bears beat the Patriots 30-24 at Soldier Field on Thursday night, the game that CBS Sports and Yahoo Sports built their Week 7 picks around. John Breech's CBS Sports "Pick Six" column covered the Patriots-Bears prediction and the week's possible upsets, and Yahoo's panel made its picks for the same game. We only have the headlines and feed summaries for those pieces, so we can't say who picked what. The result has come in since.
The Pride Of Detroit preview from Jeremy Reisman looked at the division instead of the matchup. It asked whether anyone in the NFC North could lose, and noted that outside Detroit, the last division team to lose a non-division game was Green Bay in Week 3. Chicago's two losses at that point, per the piece, were part of that picture. Its argument is that the division is strong. Thursday did nothing to change that.
The game was close in the box score. Chicago led 10-0 after the first quarter, New England scored 14 in the second to tie it at 14-14 by halftime, and the Bears then outscored the Patriots 10-3 over the second half. Cairo Santos's 58-yard field goal was the last play. Caleb Williams threw for 308 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions. Luther Burden III had four catches for 130 yards and a touchdown, and Colston Loveland caught a touchdown among his seven receptions. New England out-gained Chicago through the air and on yards per play, 7.6 to 6.1. Drake Maye threw for 321 yards and two touchdowns, and Chicago intercepted him once. The Bears had 66 plays to the Patriots' 50 and held the ball for 32:24.
The Bears are 5-2 and on a two-game winning streak. Their last loss was 31-7 at Green Bay on Oct. 11, and they followed it with a 31-23 win at Atlanta. They are second in the NFC North, one game behind the Vikings, who are 5-0 and have won their five games by a combined 45 points. The Packers are 4-2 with three straight wins, including that blowout of Chicago.
New England is 4-3 and second in the AFC East, 1.5 games behind Buffalo at 5-1. The loss ended a stretch in which the Patriots beat the Jets 26-19 and the Raiders 45-17. They are plus-17 on run differential. They play next at Miami on Nov. 1, and the Dolphins are 0-5.
The division picture gets a test on Sunday. Minnesota hosts Indianapolis, and Green Bay plays at Detroit. Chicago has no game that day. Its next one is at Seattle on Monday, Nov. 2.
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