The Bears offense does not look complete yet and Caleb Williams has much to learn.
However, the last untapped connection in the passing game can consider itself tapped.
The Williams-to-Keenan Allen collection showed up big for the first time in Sunday's Bears 35-16 win over Jacksonville in London, even if one half of the connection had a lot of trouble sleeping due to the time change.
"As soon as we landed, I had to go to sleep because I didn't sleep too much on the plane," Allen told reporters in London after the win. "So I went straight to sleep, got me a nap in, but I didn't go to sleep that night until 4:00 in the morning, you know, just because of the time difference. And the next day, same thing, didn't go to sleep. Probably 3:30-4:00 in the morning, just sitting there on Netflix, Instagram, whatever.
"It's not being able to go to sleep. And then, you know, as the week progressed, last week, I mean, yesterday I'm in the bed at 10:30."
The adjustment came just in time.
Although Allen didn't pile up big yardage, he did have five receptions for 41 yards and more importantly made the big catches to either extend drives or end them. And his five catches came on five targets. Mr. Third Down made his first appearance.
Allen had a 10 third-and-5 to extend a drive to the Jacksonville 24 on the march to a Cole Kmet's second touchdown catch in the second quarter.
He caught a third-and-8 pass for a first down of 11 yards.
He had a third-down TD catch of 9 yards over the middle, leaping for a rocket Williams threw over the middle back-shoulder to make up for the catch he made to the 1 a play earlier that was wiped out on third-and-goal from the 4 for 3 yards.
Finally, he caught the 3-yard lob pass for a TD early in the fourth quarter to make it into a rout.
Allen had the heel injury to overcome that cost him two games, but he was elated to be back contributing.
"Yeah, it's pretty sweet, pretty awesome," he said.
Williams said the two had been working extra throws after practice to get their combination re-established.
"So we practiced throughout the week," Williams said. "We had different throws that we've practiced. You know, getting the extra reps I think helps out like I've talked about before.
"We get it, you know, sometimes we get a few extra reps in individual drill or, you know, after practice and things like that.
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"And I think it, it definitely helped out, you know, all the hard work and extra work that we've been putting in."
Allen's veteran patience paid off, according to Williams.
"And, and to have somebody like Keenan, you know, his patience and, and things like that, and we we're six games in and he's just getting his first two touchdowns," Williams said. "So I think, I think his patience it without such of a, you know, he's such a great player and things like that.
"He's been great. So be able to get him those two throw the back shoulder. It's like I said, it's something that we've practiced kind of same ball that we practiced this week that I threw earlier this week. So, you know, he did a great job and, you know, super excited."
Allen's TD catch precipitated a mock tea party celebration by the receivers in the end zone. Allen seemed to be leading it but it wasn't his idea to pay tribute to the Bears' British hosts. It was D'Andre Swift's idea.
"The tea drinking tea was when we were talking about it during that drive was like whoever scores, we're going to do the little tea party thing," Allen said. "And then that was kind of the only one. We did the marching band at the end too."
Allen credits Swift's contributions, 91 yards rushing on this day, with helping open up the way for his receiving and that of the all the Bears pass catchers.
"Oh, it's been huge run game, it's come alive," Allen said. "The first couple weeks we were struggling. It's come alive a lot.
Screen game, come a lot, alive a lot."
And now Allen and the Bears continue this piece-by-piece activation of their offense that seemed to begin with Week 3 in Indianapolis.
