Bear Digest

How close the Eagles came to Bears' Super Bowl defensive dominance

The defense of coordinator Vic Fangio totally dominated Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs and made a run at the record books. Here's how close they got.
Gene Chamberlain|
Jalen Carter gets past Eagles guard Trey Smith to sack Patrick Mahomes in Philadelphia's Super Bowl win.
Jalen Carter gets past Eagles guard Trey Smith to sack Patrick Mahomes in Philadelphia's Super Bowl win. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

Vic Fangio's Philadelphia Eagles defense was good, but not 1985 Chicago Bears good.

For a while, Super Bowl LIX looked like the Eagles defense coordinated by the former Bears defensive coordinator might smash a few defensive marks set by the fabled 1985 Super Bowl XX champion defense of Buddy Ryan.

In the end, Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs did enough offensively to avoid being record setters as the Eagles won 40-22.

The Eagles totally shut down Kansas City in the first half, limiting the Chiefs to 23 yards.

It looked impressive but was only the second-best effort in Super Bowl history for the first half and wasn't close to what the Bears did in the first half of Super Bowl XX to turn that game into a rout.

The Bears held New England to minus-19 yards in the first half of that game to set a record many consider unbreakable.

The Eagles had six sacks in the fourth quarter and were approaching the sacks record of seven that is shared by those Bears, the 2021 Rams, 2015 Broncos and 1975 Steelers. But the Eagles couldn't get the seventh sack.

The Chiefs experienced trouble running the ball and ran it only 11 times, the same number the Patriots ran it against the Bears in Super Bowl XX. However, Kansas City did eventually manage 49 rushing yards against Philadelphia after they had only 3 first-half rushing yards.

The 1985 Bears own the Super Bowl record for fewest rushing yards allowed at 7 yards on those 11 New England carries. With Richard Dent winning MVP, those Bears were completely shutting down the NFL's sixth-ranked rushing offense.

The Eagles did take the ball away three times Sunday from Kansas City but that's not close to the record of nine turnovers committed by Buffalo against the 1992 Dallas Cowboys defense run by coordinator Dave Wannstedt. Dallas won 52-17.

The lopsided game got closer in the end but the Eagles didn't approach the scoring record in the Super Bowl or the margin of victory record set by the 1989 49ers in a 55-10 win over the Broncos.

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.