It had been a long time since a kickoff was returned for a touchdown against the Bears.
Vikings rookie receiver Cordarrelle Patterson’s 105-yard return last week was the first against the Bears since 2007 when the Lions’ Casey FitzSimmons returned an onside kick 41 yards for a touchdown. It was the only kickoff return in the Dave Toub era.
But don’t look at Patterson’s score as a sign that bad things are ahead on special teams for the Bears. They know what went wrong, and special teams coordinator Joe DeCamillis thought his whole kickoff unit responded after that.
“You could have driven a truck through that hole, so I thought [the Vikings] did a great job and it’s a credit to them,” DeCamillis said. “We had a bad play and they made the most of it right after that, which that’s usually a mark of a pretty good group of guys and they did that.”
Patterson had two more kickoff returns after his game-opening 105-yarder. But he averaged only 22 yards on them.
The Bears’ Devin Hester, meanwhile, set a team-record by totaling 249 return yards on five returns.
“He’s a great returner, no question about it,” DeCamillis said. “I don’t want to ever say somebody’s the best, but he’s right up there that’s for sure.”
What stood about Hester against the Vikings?
“I would say his explosion out of the cut,” DeCamillis said. “Like on that first kickoff [of 76 yards], when you watch him stick his foot in the ground, not a lot of guys can do that.”
