Feb. 14, 2026, 6:48 a.m. PT

Caleb Williams and the Cardiac Bears delivered a season that came up short of a Super Bowl, the ultimate goal, but it did not come up short of still being a special season. It was a year full of highlight plays and some of the best comebacks you will see in NFL history. Caleb Williams still has his eyes set on this team not having to come back in games to win and playing more competitive football.

Worst to first

In a recent Bears Wire article, Alyssa Barbieri analyzes Caleb’s thoughts on the 2025-26 season, all while providing her thoughts on Caleb’s play in Year 2.

“The Bears went from worst to first, from 5-12 to 11-6, including winning the NFC North for the first time since 2018 and earning their first postseason win — a thrilling wild-card victory over the Green Bay Packers — in 15 years. But their magical season came to an end with a heartbreaking divisional playoff loss to the Los Angeles Rams. And yet, the future is still incredibly bright.”

Reflecting on the journey

Bears Wire continued:

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“Following the 2025 season, Williams reflected on his team’s success and what they learned during a season where they fell just short. Just as they did throughout last season, the Bears will continue to fight. For Williams, he’s carrying that mindset into the 2026 season.

Here are Caleb Williams’ thoughts on his second season in the NFL:

“‘You get into these games, you win a bunch of games, you get into these playoff games and you’re winning,’ Williams said. ‘You play these good teams and you see what you have to go against. You see what championship level is, you see what you need to do to be at the position that you want to be at the end of the year. You see what you have to do, you figure it out. When you get knocked down, you get back up and that’s what we’re going to do. That’s my mindset. We never stay down as a team. I think we’ve shown that this year, we never stay down. We keep fighting. Bringing that mentality into next year and then finding ways to bring that hunger for all four quarters in every single game is going to be important and something that we’ll focus on throughout the offseason and throughout next year.’

“The Bears set an NFL record with seven fourth-quarter comebacks (regular season and playoffs), where they managed to overcome first-half struggles to pull off some improbable wins that ultimately led to their division title and playoff berth. While the hope is Chicago can make the transition to getting early leads and maintaining them, we know this team, with the Iceman at the helm, will continue to fight even when things seem impossible.”

Inconsistent

Caleb Williams was as good as any quarterback in the league in clutch time; the only problem was that he and the Bears’ offense more often than not struggled in the first 2 quarters. It is a special talent to be as clutch as Caleb was this season, and he gave this team confidence that they can overcome any lead. That is scary for the opposing team but great for the Bears.

Awareness of what must improve

Caleb recognizes what this team needs to do this next season, and I believe this team will be better next season, starting games and before the second half. If that happens, the Bears should be able to get even further than they did this past season. That does not factor in Caleb Williams taking another step forward. Many are thinking this team will not be able to sustain their 4th quarter elite crunch time ability, but I strongly believe this team has the right pieces in charge to make that ability sustainable and even stronger as time goes on.

Learning how to retain excellence

For the longest time, Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid always struck fear in the opponents late in games. If the Chiefs git the ball last, it was almost a guarantee they were going to win. That was the Bears this season. In year 1 with Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson, they are just getting started, so this very well could become their identity in their tenure together. Figuring out how to play competitively more consistently will be the key for this team to get to a Super Bowl.