Going into their Monday night game against the Seattle Seahawks, the Chicago Bears were facing a major challenge against Seattle’s Dark Side defense, who were a top-10 run defense going into that matchup.

That was not going to stop Bears running back D’Andre Swift. Head coach Ben Johnson had confidence in Swift and stuck to the run game. Despite the fact that Swift only averaged 2.6 yards per carry, his lowest in a game since November of last season, he still managed to find the end zone three times. Seattle had only allowed four rushing touchdowns prior to his performance.

“You get what you emphasize, and our guys know how important it is to get sevens instead of threes,” Johnson said. “It’s a credit to [Swift]. It’s a credit to the guys up front as well. I kind of feel them take it up another notch and they want to finish around the football and look to push the pile when we get down there tight. But we got a couple unscounted looks the other day and ‘Swifty’ was able to make something happen with those. So, credit to him for having great vision.”

With an average of 68.1 yards per game so far this season, Swift is on track to break his record for most rushing yards in a season at 1,158 yards. If he topped 1,000 yards this year, it would be just the third time in his career he has accomplished that feat. 

Through the first eight weeks, he leads the NFL in rushing touchdowns with 10; that is also his career-high. He is also on track to break Chicago’s all-time record for most rushing touchdowns in a season. The current record is 14, which Walter Payton accomplished in 1977 and 1979 and Gale Sayers accomplished in 1965. In 1977 and 1965, that was achieved in 14 games.