Vikings-Bears Preview: Three Keys To Victory

1. Make Mitch Trubisky uncomfortable, but keep him contained

Points are going to be hard to come by on Sunday for both teams.

"This is gonna be the game of the defenses," was how Everson Griffen described it.

For the Vikings defense, the key to stopping the Bears will be forcing Trubisky into bad decisions. They need to be able to put him under pressure, whether its Griffen and Danielle Hunter beating their man or blitzes getting home.

Once the pressure gets there, the Vikings need to make sure they don't let Trubisky pick up big chunks of yardage as a scrambler. When these teams met in Chicago last season, Trubisky ran ten times for 43 yards.

"He’s like another running back back there," Griffen said. "We gotta do a good job containing him."

This season, the Bears have prioritized getting the ball out of Trubisky's hands quickly. For the Vikings to have success, they'll need to force him into situations where he has to hold on to the ball longer and wait for routes to develop downfield. That extra time should allow the pass-rush to wreak havoc. They just have to finish the deal and force Trubisky to either rush a throw or take a sack.

"It becomes an entire unit challenge, where it all works together," Anthony Barr said. "It's not just one guy. It's going to take all three levels to get this thing done."

2. Capitalize on downfield opportunities in the passing game

The Vikings are going to continue to feed Dalvin Cook, but running the ball successfully against the Bears is extremely difficult. In order to move the ball, they're also going to have to make plays through the air.

A good place to start would be getting Stefon Diggs more involved in the offense. Diggs is off to the slowest statistical start of his career, but he's still getting open with regularity. It's on Kirk Cousins to take some shots deep to No. 14 when they're available, and make accurate throws.

"We’ll get some chances to get the ball down the field," Zimmer said. "And we have to hit them."

Last season, Diggs had 13 catches on a career-high 18 targets at Soldier Field. The Vikings will probably be in trouble and playing from behind if he approaches those numbers again, but he needs to see at least seven targets like he had against Green Bay two weeks ago. The key is making sure those targets lead to more than just one reception.

Cousins can also look to Adam Thielen and Irv Smith Jr. for big plays down the field. The challenge will be keeping Khalil Mack and the rest of the Bears' fearsome pass rush out of the backfield long enough to make those plays possible. A likely counter to that will be short dump-offs to Cook, Smith and others before pressure can develop.

Most importantly, the Vikings know they need to stay on schedule as an offense.

3. Win the special teams battle

We may learn otherwise on Sunday, but for now it seems fair to say that these are two very evenly-matched teams. The Bears are favored by 2.5 at home, which suggests that Vegas doesn't see much of a difference in quality. What that means is there's a strong possibility this game will be close. And close games frequently come down to things like special teams.

The Vikings got some good news in that department this week with the return of Marcus Sherels to return punts. Sherels is a sure-handed veteran who should help the Vikings' offense in the field position battle. The Bears have two excellent returners of their own in Tarik Cohen and former Viking Cordarelle Patterson. Big plays in the return game could be a big boost to these two offenses, which figure to have a hard time sustaining long drives against elite defenses.

The kicking game also figures to be important, as both teams have had their struggles finding consistency at kicker in recent years. Dan Bailey and Eddy Pineiro have each missed one field goal this season, although Pineiro has two more attempts.

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