Bears vs. Lions: Chicago keeps playoff hopes alive with win

The loss runs Detroit’s losing streak to eight games.

Sean Yuille of SB Nation’s Detroit Lions blog, Pride of Detroit, writes that Sunday’s performance was nothing more than a microcosm of the entire season.

After taking care of Detroit, Chicago needed Green Bay to beat Minnesota in order to earn a Wild Card berth. But the Vikings beat the Packers with a last-second field goal, ending the Bears’ season. Chicago finished the year 3-5 after a 7-1 start.

Stafford is no stranger to prolific passing seasons. He’s also fourth on the single-season pass attempts list with his 663-pass 2011, and threw for 5,038 yards in the same season, the fifth-highest total. As long as he’s throwing passes to Calvin Johnson and Jim Schwartz is the Lions’ head coach, it appears the 24-year-old Stafford will have many more prolific season ahead of him.

The Lions, at 4-11 overall at this point, are playing in the spoiler role. They can try to avenge a 13-7 loss on the road to the Bears in Week 7 on Monday night, keeping their division rivals out of the playoffs in the process.

In their 13-7 win over the Lions in a Week 7 Monday night battle, the Bears forced four Detroit turnovers and won despite being out-gained in total yardage, 340-296. The Lions didn’t notch their lone touchdown of that game until there was under a minute left in the fourth quarter.

Chicago won the first meeting between the teams this season a 13-7 defensive battle. Calvin Johnson had just 34 receiving yards in that game, his lowest total of the season.

Sunday, Dec. 30, 1 p.m. ET