Why the Bears will or won’t beat the Eagles in Week 13

It is Week 13 of the 2025 NFL season, and the Thanksgiving slate of games is complete. Now, it is time for the Chicago Bears to take center stage on Black Friday against the Philadelphia Eagles.

The Bears and Eagles are both 8-3, good enough for first place in their respective divisions. For Chicago, they have a chance to make the playoffs for the first time since 2020 and earn a division title for the first time since 2018. The Eagles, on the other hand, are the defending Super Bowl champions. Anything short of that this year would be a disappointment, given the standard they have set.

Winning a game like this is not easy for a Bears team that is loaded with young players still in the development stage. Ben Johnson, a rookie head coach, is facing his hardest test yet. A win here would go a long way in the way that the team is perceived.

There are a lot of ways that this game can go. This is why the Bears will or won't win during their trip to the City of Brotherly Love:

Why the Bears will win

The Bears will win because it means so much more to them. This is just another game for the Eagles. They may have a little extra juice knowing it's the only game on or the fact that it's Black Friday, and coming off a rough loss to the Dallas Cowboys, but this is far from the most important game of the year for them.

For the Bears, it is absolutely the most important game of the season for them. They can either win, which would move them to 9-3, extend their first-place lead, and give them a victory over a high-end team, which is something they lack this year so far. If they lose, they will fall to 8-4, and make everyone outside of Chicago wonder about them against good teams.

Ben Johnson is going to have his guys ready to play, knowing the implications of the game. Because of the fact that their competition level will be second to none coming into the game, they will find a way to win one way or another.

Why the Bears won't win

The Bears are not as good a football team as the Eagles. Despite their offense being a bit broken, they still have incredible playmakers lining up wide, a Super Bowl-winning quarterback, and a running back who can take any given handoff to the endzone from anywhere on the field.

Their offensive line is good, and their defense is more than capable. The Bears have a lot of question marks all over the field. That includes the notable amount of injuries that they are dealing with on the defensive side of the ball.

All of these issues are piling up and will be too much for the Bears to overcome against a team that doesn't have any real excuses other than it hasn't been as magical as last year yet. Losing to them won't be a travesty, but it will bring them back to the drawing board when it comes to scheming against a top team in the league and executing it.

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This article originally appeared on Bears Wire: Bears vs. Eagles: Why Chicago will or won't win in Week 13