The Green Bay Packers have won a record 11 consecutive games against their archrival, the Chicago Bears, but none of them have been like their 20-19 victory in Week 11 on Sunday.
Bears quarterback Caleb Williams drove Chicago all the way down the field following Packers quarterback Jordan Love’s go-ahead quarterback sneak score, which set up kicker Cairo Santos for the game-winning 46-yard field goal. He drilled field goals of 53 and 27 yards earlier Sunday afternoon, but Packers second-year defensive lineman Karl Brooks blocked his 46-yard try at the buzzer to preserve a one-point victory.
While blocked field goals are rare at the NFL level, Packers head coach Matt LaFleur, who has won all 11 games against the Bears since 2019, claimed special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia told the team during their Saturday night meeting that he would be surprised if they didn’t block a kick against Chicago. His words proved to be prophetic.
“Rich [Bisaccia] said to our team last night, ‘I will not understand if we come out of this game without a block, on a field goal or a PAT,'” LaFleur said, via 97.3 The Game. “Great job by our special teams coaches.”
Packers three-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle Kenny Clark affirmed what LaFleur and Bisaccia were preaching Saturday and during the week, saying “we were going to block it.”
“We talked about T.J. [Slaton] or KB [Karl Brooks] blocking the kick all week,” Clark said, via USA Today. “They’ve got holes in their field goal protection, and a couple of them got close. …. It was a problem. So Coach Rich been telling them all week, and we ended up getting one.”
In Brooks’ mind, it didn’t come down to anything technical. His will was simply stronger.
“To be honest, I didn’t see anything. Same formation. I got penetration, just wanted it more. Got a hand up.”
Pre-snap, Brooks attempted to manifest his block, and it worked Sunday with his hand hitting the bottom of the ball.
“I’m visualizing myself blocking the kick,” Brooks said. “Like I said, I just wanted it more. I just fired off the ball and wanted to get a win. It was just [an] unbelievable feeling. At first when I touched it, I didn’t think I got enough of it and it fell short. That’s when I really celebrated. … It was cool. It was a good experience.”
Safety Xavier McKinney divulged the secret sauce behind the block: Green Bay thought the Bears had a weakness in the middle of their field goal block team.
“We saw that through the middle we could get a good push through the middle, and we believed that the guys that we have were going to play big and play strong up front,” McKinney said. “We were able to get that push that we needed. We got it when we needed in a big-time situation. We got the block. We saw it just studying film throughout the week, and we were able to get it.”
The do-or-die nature of the Bears’ final field goal kick gave the Packers the extra juice required to break through for the pivotal block. Once McKinney heard the thump of the football disappear into the Windy City air, he knew the Packers had blocked the kick and won the game to improve to 7-3, their best 10-game start to a season since 2021 when they began the year 8-2. That team finished 13-4 and secured the NFC’s top seed.
“It dies real quick,” McKinney said when asked about the sound of a field goal block on the field. “It’s crazy because you hear the kick, and then I heard the hand hit it and then as soon as the hand hit it, it just dies. Once I heard that, I was like ‘Ok, it’s probably not going to get there.'”
