On a nice and cool night in the Windy City, two NFC North rivals faced off to conclude the first week of the 2025 NFL regular season. The game was a clash between two QBs who were picked in the same draft, both of them in the top-10. One of them was coming off a rough rookie season where his team lost 10 of their last 11 games of the season. The other was coming off a year in which he did not take a single regular season snap as he had to watch from the sidelines after suffering a non-devastating tear to his meniscus in the preseason. One of the passers has gotten all of the spotlight and hype awarded to him in playing in a big city market. The other has received belief and confidence from his team’s own fans, his teammates and organization and his family, including his high-school sweetheart wife. On Monday night football, both of these teams and QBs clashed in an incredibly dramatic game that featured an unexpected comeback and an amazing victory led by the QB on the visiting team.

This was a contest between the Minnesota Vikings and the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field on Monday Night Football. This game was the NFL regular season debut of J.J McCarthy, who had been waiting for more than one year to make his first professional start in the NFL. McCarthy was going up against a Chicago Bears defense that was down a couple of defensive backs due to injuries and that would be a benefit to his available receiving targets such as Justin Jefferson, Jalen Nailor, T.J Hockenson and the recently-returned to Minnesota Adam Thielen. But on the other side, the Bears had Caleb Williams making his second season debut and having a new offensive-minded head coach to work with in Ben Johnson, who made his head coaching debut for the Bears. Williams had a new offensive line to work with and try to protect him from the blitzes that would be brought by the Vikings defense under the leadership of defensive coordinator Brian Flores. With Kevin O’Connell as the offensive play caller, McCarthy finally had a chance to show what he was made of on the big stage of Monday night football. Ironically, he became a champion on a Monday night when he led the Michigan Wolverines to the College Football Playoff national title on Mon, Jan 8, 2024 over the Washington Huskies(more on the QB for that team at the end of this). So, La Grange Park, Illinois native Jonathan James McCarthy was looking to lead the Vikings to a season-opening win against his hometown Bears.

The game started with the Bears winning the toss and electing to defer possession to the second half, meaning the Vikings’ offense would see the field first. After Ty Chandler returned the opening dynamic kickoff 25 yards, McCarthy had his first plays from scrimmage. After a three-yard rush by Aaron Jones, McCarthy completed his first pass to tight end Josh Oliver for five yards on 2nd down. Unfortunately, McCarthy got swarmed on 3rd down and got sacked for a short loss. There would be a lot of drives that ended like that for the Vikings offense early on. Meanwhile, Caleb Williams led a strong opening drive that had Chicago move down the field quickly and mercilessly against the Brian Flores defense. Completing all six of his passes during the drive for 51 yards, Williams did well to evade Vikings defenders who were looking to sack him on multiple occasions in this game, including when he scrambled for a 16-yard TD following a timeout by Minnesota. With a 7-0 deficit early, McCarthy was going to have to work hard to get some scoring drives on his statline.

The second drive for McCarthy was also a three-and out as a backwards “pass” to Jefferson didn’t lead to anything and another swarm sack ended the threat. The defense finally got a stop on Williams following a false start and a screen pass to Rome Odunze on 3rd and short that ended up backing the Bears up four yards. The first quarter ended with a couple of good carries for Jordan Mason, who was making his Vikings debut following a stellar showing on the opening Monday night game last season when he was on the San Francisco 49ers. On the first play of the second quarter, McCarthy threw his first deep pass of his career as he launched a ball deep to the left for Jones, who couldn’t catch the ball but was interfered with by cornerback Nahshon Wright, who committed a 31-yard pass interference foul. The offense was finally in Chicago territory and had a chance to tie the game with a touchdown. McCarthy had a designed scramble that had him pick up a first down in the red zone and after a couple of rushes by Mason, McCarthy threw a third down pass to his fellow “JJ” in Jefferson that landed incomplete through the arms of the star wideout. The Vikings settled for a field goal as Will Reichard made his first kick of the season from 31 yards out.

Down 7-3, the Vikings started doing better on the defensive front against Williams, who would be hampered by a couple of false start penalties by his teammates and in field goal range for kicker Cairo Santos, the Bears decided to “go for it” on 4th & 3. Ben Johnson has brought over some of that aggressive analytical mentality that he fostered with the Detroit Lions as offensive coordinator with head coach Dan Campbell and whether that is a good thing or a bad thing depends on how those decisions to attempt fourth down conversions result. In this case, after calling a timeout following a run on third down by D’Andre Swift, it was not a good decision to attempt a fourth down inside the Vikings’ 25-yard line as Williams threw a fast ball that was unable to be caught by DJ Moore. That stop would definitely loom large in this game.

In this second quarter, there were three consecutive drives that ended in three-and-outs. McCarthy continued his growing pains as a short pass to Jefferson that was completed for his first official “JJ”-hookup was a yard short on third down and penalties basically killed the next three-and-out drive for the Vikings. The defense forced a good three-and-out against Williams, who would spearhead a solid drive with good field position that headed into the two-minute warning and nearly ran out the clock in the first half. A good 7-yard pass to Olamide Zaccheaus resulted in the wide receiver stepping out of bounds, forcing O’Connell not to use a timeout right away. O’Connell let the clock run on a couple of rushes by Swift, then after a third down stop the Vikings called one of their two remaining timeouts. But that was after Rome Odunze had gone out of bounds. The defense was preparing for the Bears offense to potentially attempt another fourth down conversion being two yards away from the first-down marker, but they would opt to kick a field goal. Santos made a 42-yard attempt that put Chicago back up by seven points.

With less than 24 seconds left to go and one timeout to work with, it was a big ask for McCarthy to lead the offense into field goal range for Reichard before the half ended. But things turned out differently as Myles Price had a good kickoff return that lowered the clock under 20 seconds. On the first play from scrimmage from his team’s 31-yard line, McCarthy unloaded a bullet to the left that was caught by Jalen Nailor, who was tackled down in bounds at the Bears’ 41-yard line for a 28-yard gain. O’Connell called the Vikings’ final timeout and even though there were 11 seconds left on the clock, the offense was pulled off the field and Reichard attempted his career-long 59-yard field goal. The snap was good, the hold was pure and the ball was kicked hard by Reichard as it would sail barely through the lower uprights to put some points on the board for the Vikings before the half ended. Down 10-6 at halftime, things were starting to gel for McCarthy, who had led four drives that ended in three-and-outs but two scoring drives to at least give his team some positive momentum heading into the locker room. Completing only five of his eight passing attempts for 48 yards and having one of his drives aided by a pass interference foul, McCarthy definitely needed to have a strong second half in order to lead his team to a victory at Soldier Field. Caleb Williams had a solid first half with 13 of his 16 passes completed for 112 yards along with 32 yards on the ground for nearly 150 yards from scrimmage. The game was still very much up for grabs due to the inefficiency from the Chicago offense after the opening-drive TD. The second half was going to be an intense one, without a doubt.

The second half began with the Bears having possession and the Flores defense brought the pressure onto Williams, who threw three incomplete passes and an immediate punt occurred. One of the unsung heroes for the Vikings in this grinder of a game was Myles Price, who did a good job returning some kickoffs and a lot of punts booted his way by Chicago punter Tory Taylor. Price had a solid run on this punt return to around midfield to give the McCarthy-led offense some solid field position to work with. On the first play of the second half, McCarthy threw an incomplete target to Jefferson, but he was hit hard in the head by Bears linebacker Dayo Odeyingbo, who got called for roughing the passer. That 15-yard penalty put the Vikings back in field goal range just like that. After a couple of weak runs by Aaron Jones, it was 3rd down and McCarthy needed to make a clutch play to keep the drive going. After receiving the snap from Ryan Kelly, McCarthy aimed a pass towards Jefferson again. But the ball was picked off by Nahshon Wright, who would run all the way back 74 yards for a pick-six defensive touchdown for the Bears. McCarthy made his first major mistake as a QB in the NFL by throwing an interception that was returned the other way. Chicago had all the momentum up 17-6 and McCarthy needed to settle himself down in order to finally lock into this game. Thankfully, with a pick-6 occurring, it gave young J.J the chance to get back onto the field right away without sitting around and feeling bad for himself. Every QB throws a pick-6 at some point. It even happened a couple of times to famous Michigan Wolverine alum Tom Brady, including in Super Bowl 51. The New England Patriots got down by a score of 28-3 against the Atlanta Falcons, and what did number 12 do? He led his team back from the brink and the fan base for New England went from despair to euphoria on that fateful night of Feb. 5, 2017. Down by only 11 points in the third quarter, there was still time to make things right and a good defense was keeping the Vikings in this Monday Night game. All McCarthy needed to do was get into rhythm and the dominos would all fall into place.

After that point swing, McCarthy led two more drives that resulted in three-and-outs, including one where Adam Thielen almost made his first catch back in purple trim but the ball was ripped out of his hands for an incompletion on third down. The offense was really struggling on 3rd downs and they needed to convert on one eventually in order to make this a competitive game. The Minnesota defense was doing its part with more pressure on Williams and good tackling on short yardage passes stopping the Bears from advancing down the field. A long drive by Chicago that consumed the rest of time in the 3rd quarter occurred where the chains would be moved and the defense suffered a tough injury to Blake Cashman, who pulled a hamstring while trying to chase down Caleb. D’Andre Swift started getting countless carries and the Bears were running it down the defense’s throat. But an offensive holding penalty by Darnell Wright and an intentional grounding penalty by Williams backed the Bears out of field goal range. A 3rd & 30 pass to Zaccheaus got Chicago back into field goal range to end the third quarter. The long field goal attempt by Santos wouldn’t be easy, but if he made it the home team would be up by two touchdowns to begin the fourth quarter.

The 50-yard kick by Santos occurred on a different side of the field than the one where the Bears offense had been driving towards and whether that impacted the outcome of the kick is now in question, due to the snapped ball not being put down well by Tory Taylor as the holder. The ball was kicked by Santos and it swung to the right past the uprights. The kick was no good and the Vikings now had great field position to take advantage of. Another kicking mistake by Chicago would come back to cost them dearly. This was J.J McCarthy’s chance to lead the Vikings back into this game and have his first touchdown drive. A couple of strong runs by Jordan Mason started this crucial drive on a good note as he picked up 25 yards to get the Vikings into Bears’ territory. McCarthy then threw a solid pass to Jefferson, who caught it on the left side of the field and got both of his feet down in bounds before going to the sidelines. It was a 17-yard gain and the offense was back in the red zone. Following another run by Mason and a batted ball for an incomplete pass, it was third down again. The offense had yet to convert on a third down and the pressure was on. If they failed, a potential fourth down try could’ve been in order. But McCarthy moved his way around the pocket and zipped a tight pass towards the middle of the end zone, where Justin Jefferson made an amazing catch to finally get the Vikings a touchdown. It was McCarthy’s first TD drive and it came off a missed field goal by his hometown team. The drive wasn’t done yet, as O’Connell decided to have the offense attempt a two-point conversion. The first two-point attempt was an incomplete pass towards Thielen, but there was a foul for an illegal use of hands by Odeyingbo that gave the Vikings a second chance on the two-point attempt. On the redo of two-point attempt, Jefferson was not on the field and a potential run play was in order. Instead, McCarthy did a play-action move that had him throw the ball to the left, where Josh Oliver caught it but he would be tackled behind the line and short of the end zone. So, the Vikings were down 17-12 now and this game was going to have a dramatic finish to it. Just like plenty of other matchups have against the Bears at Soldier Field over the past several years.

Following a kickoff return by Devin Duvernay, Williams would finally be sacked by the Vikings as Javon Hargrave got his first sack of the season. Eric Wilson then made a good tackle for loss on a run on 2nd down, and on third down Williams tried to throw a low-arching pass to his right to Rome Odunze, but Andrew Van Ginkel broke up the pass and nearly had a chance to run it back for a pick-6, something he did twice last season. A three-and-out forced by the defense allowed McCarthy to come back onto the field right away to lead a potential lead-changing drive. Another great punt return by Price had the offense start this big drive right at midfield. A solid nine-yard run by Aaron Jones started this drive out strong. McCarthy took a shot downfield and threw the ball up high for Jefferson to try and catch it. But the ball went through the hands of the Griddy-dancing receiver for an incomplete pass. On third and short, McCarthy aimed another pass downfield, but it was well incomplete. However, there was a flag on the field for pass interference on Tyrique Stevenson, who was called for a controversial foul while covering Nailor. It appeared that little contact was made on Nailor, who tripped on the poorly-maintained grass turf at Soldier Field. The penalty moved the Vikings up 14 yards to set up a first down play in field goal range. On the play, McCarthy would stand in the pocket and aimed the ball on a high arch to the right heading towards the end zone. Aaron Jones was in wide receiver formation and he ran to catch the ball and make his way into the end zone while being covered by two Chicago defenders. The Vikings had taken the lead and they were going for two again. This time, they converted as McCarthy threw a solid pass to Adam Thielen, who made his first big reception back on his childhood team. That catch did not count for a reception on Thielen’s stat sheet due to it coming on a two-point conversion attempt, but it was undoubtedly huge as the Vikings now had a three-point lead over the Bears. A 27-yard connection between McCarthy and Jones had given Minnesota their second end zone score of the fourth quarter and there was more action to come in this insane final period.

Reichard kicked the ball into the end zone for a touchback, bringing the ball out to the 35-yard line. After completing a first down pass to Odunze, Williams got sacked again by Hargrave, who had a pair of sacks on his ledger in his Vikings debut. Williams then threw a couple of incomplete passes to conclude this drive for Chicago, whose fans were getting restless at the inconsistent play of their offense. On the punt by Taylor, Eric Wilson blocked the ball after it was punted by Taylor and it rolled forward for only a net distance of 25 yards. A clutch play there by Wilson, who is back on the Vikings after spending four seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers. To start this drive from their 32-yard line, the Vikings had Mason run again for a solid gain of 19 yards as he started breaking tackles and picking up a lot of yards after contact. Now in Bears’ territory again, the offense picked up another first down after a McCarthy pass to Hockenson and a solid short yardage run by Jones. The clock was starting to tick down to crunch time under five minutes and the Vikings were looking for that desperate add-on score. McCarthy threw a couple of more completions to Jones and Jefferson to get the offense back into the red zone. With only two timeouts left due to a bad challenge flag thrown by Johnson to review a play in the third quarter regarding whether a potential fumble occurred on a low catch that Hockenson made that was upheld because his knee was still on the field, the Bears called their second timeout of the half with under three minutes left to play. Things were getting tight and the Vikings could end the game with a couple of first downs or seal it off with a touchdown. The latter happened when McCarthy had a scramble that had him run to the right and break through into the end zone on the pylon. The Vikings sideline went nuts as O’Connell and the entire coaching staff were pumped up by that clutch design run by J.J McCarthy, who had led three touchdown drives in the fourth quarter of this game. The extra point put the Vikings up by 10 points and with time running out, Chicago was almost done for in this fight.

Williams did lead one last drive that had the Bears’ offense get into Minnesota territory fast, having them be in a tough position where they had to either go for the touchdown or take the field goal being down by two possessions and to score before the two-minute warning. A couple of penalties by the Vikings defense stopped the clock and Williams nearly scored another touchdown on a scramble, but he was ruled a yard short due to him having his foot on the line. The next play was a quick one-yard TD pass to Odunze to give the Bears a score before the two-minute warning. On the ensuing kickoff, Santos would have to boot the ball out of the end zone so that no time came off the clock. But that wasn’t what happened as Ty Chandler fielded the ball in the end zone. O’Connell and a couple of players on the sideline signaled Chandler to run out of the end zone to get the clock under two minutes, thus robbing Chicago of that means of stopping the clock. Chandler ran well from inside the end zone and would keep hold of the ball as he got tackled with under two minutes left to play. The offense could now seal off this game, but they chose to be more conservative in their play-calling as three straight runs milked the clock down to under 20 seconds by the time fourth down came about. A solid punt by Ryan Wright set up one last chance for the Bears offense, which attempted a lateral play to get past the Vikings defenders set up downfield but the lateral sequence didn’t last long. The game was over and the Vikings had won it 27-24.

An incredible comeback led by the “redshirt rookie” QB J.J McCarthy, who shined bright on his hometown field. Having gone to his first NFL game as a four-year old boy in Oct. 2007, little J.J saw his hometown Bears face the Vikings, who had a star rookie running back by the name of Adrian Peterson star out for them. The defending NFC-champion Bears were beaten that day and the young kid wearing a Brian Urlacher jersey would eventually become a star player himself as a QB in the area. Attending Nazareth Academy in his hometown of La Grange Park, Ill, McCarthy rarely lost when he started a game and that applied when he went down to Florida to play at IMG Academy during the COVID-19 pandemic in the fall of 2020. Being a winner at Michigan for two seasons, McCarthy has proven himself time and again as a born winner and he showed the entire football world what he was made of on the first Monday night game of the season. Passing for 143 yards and rushing for 25 yards with his three touchdowns(two passing, one rushing), McCarthy said in a postgame interview with ESPN’s Lisa Salters that this experience was “surreal” for his first NFL win as a starting QB. McCarthy also said that he “couldn’t be more proud of the guys up front”. Talking about his pick-6 mistake, McCarthy said that he was figuring out the offensive playbook one play at a time and gave credit to “Coach O’Connell” for keeping him engaged. McCarthy also became the first QB to score three touchdowns in the fourth quarter of his NFL debut game since Steve Young in 1985 for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. McCarthy added that staying on the same page in game one was important and the response from the team in being down by a wide margin of points was good. When asked what he said to his teammates when they were down by a lot, J.J simply said “That we gotta believe”. McCarthy concluded by saying that playing in front of his family and friends at their hometown stadium was a “dream come true”. Indeed it was for his debut.

This was also an impressive win for the Vikings considering that they were down a couple of their key main players. Christian Darrisaw was questionable for this game in trying to make his first start since suffering a torn ACL and MCL in a Week 8 game against the Los Angeles Rams last season. But he was ruled out of this one. Justin Skule had to start in Darrisaw’s place at left tackle and he struggled at first to contain the pass rush from the Chicago defenders. But eventually Skule settled in with the rest of the offensive line, which did an amazing job at protecting McCarthy and letting the young QB perform to his highest standards. The defense also had to adjust with Harrison Smith being out due to an illness that he has been battling for a couple of weeks. Not having Smith in there as a potential spy on Williams was tough going for a pass rush that couldn’t quite get Williams down enough early on due to the strong new interior offensive line for Chicago. But Brian Flores made some necessary adjustments and the defense got the job done when the chips were down. The injury to Cashman is a tough one, but having Eric Wilson back on the roster is a plus and he can fill in for Cashman for as long as it is required.

With this win, the Vikings join the Green Bay Packers in the winner’s circle in the NFC North. Green Bay defeated the Lions in a home opener at Lambeau Field on Sun, Sept 7. Now the Vikings will have their home opener against the Atlanta Falcons, who barely lost their season-opening game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. The Falcons have Michael Penix Jr as their full-time starting QB this season and he was taken with the number 8 pick in the 2024 draft. The Vikings could have potentially drafted Penix, but they settled for McCarthy and now both these QBs who faced off in the 2024 College Football Playoff National Championship Game will play against each other on the big stage of Sunday Night Football. U.S Bank Stadium will open up its 10th season of hosting Vikings games in a primetime battle that will definitely have the fans in purple go nuts for J.J McCarthy, who is making his official home debut as a Viking. The potential long-awaited heir to Fran Tarkenton that the franchise has been looking fifty years for will play in front of the home fans in Minneapolis, Minn, for a game that so many have been waiting so long for. Sam Darnold was a good entertaining stand-in last season, but now the “Dawn of the J.J Days” have come. It’s time to see what McCarthy can do in front of the home fans at the Big Bank. Also Adam Thielen will be making a start at wide receiver in his first game back at the stadium that he saw built in the first years of his blossomed career as an undrafted free agent. Back in purple, Thielen will definitely have some loud cheers from supporters who still have his jersey as one of their own. After that game, three straight games against AFC North opponents will occur before the team’s bye in Week 6.

So, a good 1-0 start to the season has happened and it wouldn’t have been possible without the resilience shown by J.J McCarthy, the strong performance by the defense and some clutch play by the special teams. Simply put, the Vikings did better in all those three departments than the Bears did. That’s how football games are usually won. And it’s now a streak of six straight seasons that a Vikings team has gone into Soldier Field and won. Three of those games have happened on Monday Night Football broadcasts. Most of the results against Chicago have been close, but the Vikings have earned this streak as they once again have beaten the Bears on the home turf of the old fabled franchise that celebrated the 40th anniversary of its Super Bowl 20 victory following the 1985 season. Spoiling a home opener is always fun work for the boys in purple.