Saints smother Bears to earn wild-card win
Drew Brees threw two touchdown passes and the New Orleans defence dominated in a 21- 9 victory over the visiting Chicago Bears in an NFC wild-card game on Sunday afternoon.
The NFC South champion Saints, who were 12- 4 in the regular season, advance to host the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the divisional round next weekend. New Orleans won both regular-season meetings.
Brees completed 28- of- 39 passes for 265 yards while Chicago’s Mitchell Trubisky completed 19-of-29 for 199 yards.
The Bears, who finished the regular season 8-8 to claim the last wild card in the NFC, gained just 239 yards and 11 first downs, four of which came in the final two minutes.
The Saints welcomed back their top two offensive weapons — wide receiver Michael Thomas, who was activated off injured reserve, and running back Alvin Kamara, who scored six touchdowns on Christmas Day before being sidelined by testing positive for COVID-19.
But the Bears defence kept them and the New Orleans offence contained in the first half, which ended with the Saints holding a 7-3 lead.
On New Orleans’ first possession of the third quarter, the team put together an 85-yard drive that ended with Brees’ six-yard touchdown pass to Latavius Murray.
Kamara ran three yards for a touchdown to give the Saints a 21-3 lead with 8:50 remaining.
Trubisky threw a 19-yard touchdown pass to Jimmy Graham as time expired.
Brees connected with Thomas three times on the Saints’ first two possessions, the third completion being an 11- yard touchdown that gave New Orleans a 7- 0 lead at the end of the first quarter.
The Bears were in scoring range on their first drive, but they passed on a field- goal attempt on fourthand-4 at the Saints 34 and Trubisky was stopped after scrambling for a two-yard gain.
New Orleans missed out on points when Wil Lutz was wide right on a 50-yard field-goal try.
John Jenkins recovered a fumble by Taysom Hill, leading to Cairo Santos’ 36- yard field goal that cut the lead to 7-3.