(2) The lack of success on early downs put the Bears in too many third-and-long situations against an aggressive Vikings defense.

In the first half, Bears running backs were limited to 27 yards on 12 carries and the offense committed seven penalties, resulting in third-and-13, third-and-12 and third-and-29 situations the unit was unable to convert.

“We didn’t have as much efficiency in the running game as we would have liked just to keep things on track,” Johnson said. “We ended up with a number of third-and-longs over the course of that game, which is really where [the Vikings] thrive. I don’t know if there’s another team that we’ve gone against that when you look at the distribution of where the third downs occur, third-and-10-plus was all over their tape, which is a credit to them. That’s what they do. They wreak some havoc and they get you off schedule, and they reap the benefits from it.

“That happened to us a lot in the first half, and a lot of that was self-induced as well. The penalties were a major factor, more so than the weather or anything. It was the penalties, and things that we really hadn’t seen in practice; they showed up there on game day. Even when we felt like we were getting a little momentum and staying ahead of the schedule there, we kind of shot ourselves in the foot a couple times.

“We were a lot better in the second half, no penalties offensively in the second half, and we ended up getting more yards, and I want to say [of] five possessions, three of them made it down to the red zone. I think more importantly than anything, you start with a first-and-goal from the 1, a first-and-goal from the 6 and, like we said, the three shots at the end of the game, and we end up getting zero points out of all three of those opportunities. That’s really the tale of the second half.”

(3) After nearly deflecting Cairo Santos’ 50-yard field goal in the first quarter, the Vikings’ Isaiah Rodgers blocked Santos’ 23-yard attempt that could have tied the game 6-6 with 6:21 to play.

“The operation was not clean,” Johnson said. “A high snap didn’t help. That first field goal was a warning shot as far as I’m concerned. No. 2 was right off the edge. If he didn’t touch it, then he was darn close to touching it then. [It was] something we addressed on the sideline, and we weren’t able to get corrected the second time, so certainly in a race to get that right.”