Bears Beat Seahawks 34-17 and End a 30-Game Run of Close Calls

34-17, and the streak is over

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The Bears beat Seattle 34-17 on Monday night, and the Seahawks are 4-4. For almost two years, this team hadn’t lost a game by more than four points. That streak ended at 30.

Last week, Chicago traded two first-round picks for one defensive tackle, Jeffery Simmons. With him on the field, Seattle averaged 3 yards a play. In the 8 plays he sat out, it averaged 13.3.

And Seattle still clawed back to 20-17 in the fourth quarter. Then it came apart in about three minutes.

Sources ESPN Seattle Sports ESPN

How the Bears beat Seattle 34-17

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This game came with receipts. Last Tuesday, Seattle traded a third-round pick and a fifth to Indianapolis for Quenton Nelson, a guard who made the Pro Bowl in each of his first eight seasons. Two days later came the Simmons trade: two firsts and a fourth to Tennessee. Monday night was billed as Nelson versus Simmons.

Nelson held up his end. He allowed one pressure and no sacks, and had his best run-blocking grade of the season. Seattle ran for 81 yards anyway. Simmons, in his first game as a Bear, made six tackles, two of them for a loss, and sacked Sam Darnold. Seattle paid a third for its guy. Chicago paid two firsts for its guy. On Monday night, Chicago got its money’s worth.

It started the way it would go. The Bears’ first drive ran 17 plays and 80 yards and took eight and a half minutes, their longest opening drive since 2007. Luther Burden caught the touchdown from the 1. Seattle hadn’t allowed a touchdown on an opening drive since the 2025 opener.

Seattle got inside the Chicago 20-yard line four times and scored one touchdown. Its best moment of the first half came from farther out. With 30 seconds left, Jaxon Smith-Njigba beat Tyrique Stevenson down the left sideline for a 43-yard touchdown. Then Jason Myers pushed the extra point wide left. 13-9 at the half.

Chicago opened the second half the same way it opened the first. Ten plays, 69 yards, and D’Andre Swift ran it in from the 1. Leonard Williams left on that drive with a stinger and didn’t come back. 20-9.

Seattle answered with its longest drive of the night, six and a half minutes, and it ended about as badly as a drive can. JSN caught a pass at the 1, and the officials flagged him for offensive pass interference. Two plays later, Myers lined up a 33-yard field goal, and Austin Booker blocked it.

Then DeMarcus Lawrence took the ball away from tight end Colston Loveland at the Chicago 25. More on him in a minute. On the drive that followed, Darnold even threw an interception, and a holding penalty erased it. Two plays after that, he found Cooper Kupp for a 7-yard touchdown. Remember the missed extra point? That’s why Seattle had to go for two. Tory Horton caught it. 20-17, eleven and a half minutes to go, and Lumen was loud again.

It lasted about three minutes. Mike Morris was flagged for unnecessary roughness on the kickoff, so Chicago started at its own 44. On third-and-9, Chicago threw a backward pass to Kalif Raymond, and he went 39 yards to the 5. Swift scored on the next play. 27-17.

Seattle’s next drive ended at its own 22. Booker tipped Darnold’s pass at the line, and defensive tackle James Lynch caught it and rumbled to the 6. That’s Darnold’s ninth interception, and his sixth straight game with one. Only Justin Herbert has thrown more. Swift punched in his third touchdown from the 5. 34-17. Seattle’s last drive reached the Chicago 7 and died on fourth down.

Mike Macdonald didn’t dress it up. “Tip of the cap to the Bears, they won the game, they won it fair and square, and they won it in all three phases.” The third phase is the one that stings. Special teams made five costly mistakes on Monday, including the missed extra point, the blocked field goal and the personal foul on the kickoff. Three weeks ago, Macdonald said “our special teams took a jump.” It jumped, all right. Right into the other team’s lap.

Chicago is 6-2, and it just beat both of last season’s Super Bowl teams in back-to-back games, a first for the franchise. Happy to help with the history. Seattle has lost three of its last four, and Macdonald said the sense of urgency to improve “right now is high.” Good. It should be.

Sources ESPN ESPN box score ESPN play-by-play Seahawks.com Yahoo Sports Fox Sports Spokesman-Review

Golden Egg: DeMarcus Lawrence

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The day after every game, the newsletter hands out the Golden Egg. This week it goes to DeMarcus Lawrence.

Lawrence is 34, in his 13th NFL season, and he has already said it will be his last. Early in the fourth quarter, Seattle was down 20-9 and had just had a field goal blocked. Mike Morris sacked Caleb Williams back to the Chicago 13. On the next snap, Williams threw short to Loveland, and Lawrence ripped the ball out of his hands and recovered it himself at the 25.

One forced fumble. One fumble recovery. Eight points off the turnover.

It didn’t hold up. But on a night when the offense couldn’t score from close range, Lawrence handed it the ball 25 yards from the end zone. If this is the farewell tour, he’s still playing the hits.

Sources NBC Sports

Next: Arizona, and your turn

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The Cardinals come to Lumen Field on Sunday. Seattle has beaten them ten straight times. But Arizona just made Gardner Minshew, the old Washington State quarterback, its starter, after he came off the bench in Dallas and threw three fourth-quarter touchdowns in an overtime win. And Seattle’s defensive front is banged up. Leonard Williams left Monday with that stinger, Connor O’Toole hurt his foot, and Uchenna Nwosu missed the game with an ankle.

Seattle hasn’t had a losing record at any point this season. Lose Sunday, and it will.

So, one question. If you could fix one thing before Sunday, is it the interceptions, the run game, or special teams? Tell me in the comments.

Sources Fox Sports ESPN Seahawks.com