Aaron Rodgers could finally get his wish: an NFC championship game at Lambeau Field.
All the Green Bay Packers have to do is win another game and that becomes a reality.
Rodgers made sure that in Sunday’s regular season finale, in part, thanks to the perfect first half on the road to a 35-16 victory over the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field.
He gave the Packers (13-3) No. 1 in the NFC playoffs. With that comes a goodbye from the first round – the only one in the conference due to the extensive playoff field – and home games from now until the Super Bowl. While the other six teams in the NFC playoffs play next weekend, the Packers are stopped until the divisional round, either on January 16 or January 17.
Rodgers played in four NFC championship games, winning just one – 10 years ago at Soldier Field. After losing last year’s NFC title game to the 49ers, the Packers’ third straight loss in the conference title game after the 2014 Seattle Conference Championship game and the 2016 Atlanta game, Rodgers spoke with longing for one’s desire the Lambeau.
“I said that before: we have to take one of them home,” Rodgers said after losing 37-20 to the 49ers last January. “It’s a different game. It’s different to play in 20-degree weather and snow. Cold and wind are a different kind of game than playing here.”
The game in Week 16 against the Titans showed that. The Packers threw Tennessee 40-14 on a snow-covered field and excelled Sunday in a 32-degree afternoon in Chicago.
The Packers last had No. 1 after their regular 15-1 season in 2011, but lost to the Giants 37-20 in an NFC divisional playoff game at Lambeau Field.
The Packers ran 21 games in the first half and scored 21 points. Rodgers completed his first 11 passes, including 10-for-10 for 155 yards and three touchdowns, including a 72-yarder to Marquez Valdes-Scantling in the second quarter. It should have been his first 12 and four touchdowns, but Valdes-Scantling gave up a 53-yard touchdown on the opening unit of the third quarter.
After a slow start to the second half, the Packers sealed things when Aaron Jones scored on a 4-meter touchdown run and remained 3:47. In the same action, Davante Adams broke Sterling Sharpe’s franchise record for one-season receptions (112). On the next trip, he matched the Sharpe franchise record of the season for touchdowns, also with the 18th. That equated to third place in NFL history. Only Randy Moss (23 in 2007) and Jerry Rice (22 in 1987) caught more. And Adams missed two full games – and half of the other – due to an early hamstring injury.
The touchdown with Adams was Rodgers’ fourth game, giving him 48 touchdown passes for the season (and only five interceptions) with the best career and franchise, ending his case for a third MVP.
The Chicago win came just three days after the Packers lost David Bakhtiari’s left-back to the All-Pro with a late-season knee injury. Billy Turner charged down the left and had a wonderful opportunity to score the equalizer for Bakhtiari, but the shot went well wide of the goal. Rodgers was fired once.
Moreover, the Packers feel better about their defense, which was hit by the 49ers in the championship game last season.