SEATTLE — Halfway across the country Monday night, Ayo Dosunmu was telling Timberwolves reporters that he liked to drive to the basket the way a running back would carry the ball. The Chicago-born Dosunmu, a former Bulls guard and a lifelong Bears fan, was asked if he tried to mimic the Bears’ D’Andre Swift.
No, he joked — he’s more like former Vikings running back Adrian Peterson.
While Dosunmu was trying to score points with his new city, Swift was scoring three touchdowns in the Bears’ 34-17 win Monday night against the defending Super Bowl champion Seahawks at Lumen Stadium.
The Bears’ running back wasn’t flashy — he averaged just 2.6 yards per carry and never had a run longer than seven yards — but he remained the metronome on which the Bears’ offense is calibrated.
Quarterback Caleb Williams’ Year 3 leap doesn’t happen without the steadiness of Swift. The defense doesn’t stay fresh without the Bears running clock with their running game, which has contributed to their league-best time of possession. And coach Ben Johnson’s creativity doesn’t get unleashed unless he can trust his running back.
“I know he didn't have a ton of yards, but 27 attempts and three touchdowns, every single yard was earned by him,” Johnson said. “Those are hard yards to come by.”
The Seahawks entered the game allowing the fewest total yards and the sixth-fewest rushing yards per game in the NFL. The game was a grind.
Swift ran for three touchdowns for just the second time in his career, giving him a whopping 10 on the season. The last Bears running back that could say that through eight games was Rick Casares in 1956.
He’s had a rushing touchdown in his fourth-straight game for the second time in his Bears career. The last Bear who could say that was Neal Anderson, most recently in 1990.
And while invoking this name might be sacrilege, it’s true nonetheless: Swift has more rushing touchdowns this season than Walter Payton did in eight of his 13 seasons with the Bears.
“We just came into the game with a mindset of, we'll just take our four [yards] as far as the run game goes,” right tackle Darnell Wright said. “And then when the defense opens up the pass game, we look to Caleb and the receivers and how they play.”:
Johnson insisted the Bears keep pounding even after Swift went into the locker room at halftime with just 11 carries for 26 yards and no touchdowns. He had 16 carries for 43 yards and three rushing scores in the second half.
“Shoutout to Ben for sticking with the run against a great opponent,” Swift said. “[The Seahawks] made it tough tonight. When we got down to the red zone, O-line, receivers did their job.”
In doing so, the Bears shined in an area that earlier in the season was a weakness. Monday night, they scored touchdowns all four times they went inside the Seahawks’ 20.The Bears went 3-for-4 the week before and 2-for-3 in Williams’ return in Atlanta.
Swift’s workload might shrink whenever the Bears get Kyle Monangai back. He seemed to be their preferred short-yardage back before suffering a turf toe injury in Week 4 against the Jets.
Swift proved adept in his absence. In the four games Monangai has missed, Swift has run for a staggering seven touchdowns. Only six NFL running backs have more than seven touchdowns all year.
Even more importantly, Swift hasn’t fumbled since he was benched toward the end of Week 4 for losing his second fumble of the year. Swift leads the league in touchdown runs and ranks 12th with 68.1 yards per game.
Monday night, he had as many touchdowns in one half as any Bears running back or wide receiver has all year, combined.
“We had our work cut out for us,” Swift said. “I’m just proud of the way we fought in all three phases.”
