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Bears look to reach .500 against Vikings

Oct 14, 2007 - 10:35 AM Minnesota (1-3) at Chicago (2-3) Sunday 1:00 pm EDT

CHICAGO (Ticker) -- The Chicago Bears may have saved their season with an unlikely win at Lambeau Field.

Now, the Bears look to climb back to .500 when they host the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday in another NFC North Division battle.

The defending NFC champions have a reason to believe they can recover from their 1-3 start and make the playoffs - they did it just two years ago.

In 2005, the Bears rebounded after losing three of their first four games to capture the NFC North with an 11-5 record.

Chicago has another reason for optimism - it has won six straight at home against the Vikings, including a 23-13 victory last season.

But the Bears season appeared to be on life support on Sunday before it rallied from a 10-point second-half deficit to defeat the Green Bay Packers, 27-20. Brian Griese tossed a 34-yard touchdown pass to Desmond Clark with 2:11 remaining for the winning score.

Instead of falling four games behind Green Bay, the Bears pulled with two games of the Packers. In NFL history, no team has rallied from a four-game deficit to win a division.

"There's a big difference between 2-3 and 1-4," Bears coach Lovie Smith said. "As much as anything, we needed to get a win."

The difference for Chicago is that the defense finally performed like the unit that helped lead the Bears to the Super Bowl last season.

After allowing 341 total yards and 15 first downs in the first half, the Bears held the Packers to just 98 yards and three first downs in the second half. That included five straight three-and-outs that ended with an interception and four punts.

The previous week, Chicago yielded an NFL-record 34 points in a 37-27 loss to the Detroit Lions.

If Chicago's defense is back to last season's level, then that spells bad news for the Vikings, who have dropped three in a row and are 27th in passing.

Minnesota's game plan likely will be to get the ball into the hands of running back Adrian Peterson as much as possible. The rookie is ninth in the NFL in rushing as surpassed 100 yards in three of Minnesota's first four games.

The Vikings have gotten poor quarterback play as the trio of Tarvaris Jackson, Kelly Holcomb and Brooks Bollinger have combined to complete only 53 percent of their passes with only only two touchdowns and six interceptions.