44-0 : Bears Unleash Their Defense on Cowboys

It was a Texas-sized display of defensive power. The Dallas Cowboys, who usually win in this stadium, never had a chance Sunday, losing a 44-0 mismatch to the unbeaten Chicago Bears.

The Chicago defense scored the game’s first two touchdowns on intercepted passes and set up another 10 points for a 24-0 lead before halftime as the Bears won their 11th straight.

Against the blitzing, sacking Chicago team, the Cowboys couldn’t advance the ball past the Bears’ 38-yard line and suffered their worst defeat since they began playing football more than a quarter-century ago.

“We have a reasonable chance to win the rest of them,” Chicago tackle Keith Van Horne said after Walter Payton, William Perry, Richard Dent and Mike Richardson made this one look easy.

Dent, a defensive lineman, intercepted a deflected pass on the Dallas one-yard line and stepped into the end zone for the winning touchdown in the first quarter.

Richardson, a Chicago cornerback, sprinted 36 yards with another interception for another touchdown in the second quarter. And the rout was on.

“Our defense dominated them. Our offense just mopped up,” Chicago Coach Mike Ditka said.

One of the moppees, Perry, the 308-pound rookie, was in for three offensive plays.

On one of them, he blotted out a Dallas defensive back, Michael Downs, as quarterback Steve Fuller sneaked in for the Bears’ third touchdown.

On the preceding play, carrying the ball to the Dallas one-foot line, Perry thought he had scored.

“When I got up,” he said, “I was over the (goal) line.”

In the second half, making his final offensive appearance, Perry drew his first penalty as a fullback when he got behind Payton on the one-yard line and shoved him into the end zone.

Illegal use of hands, the referee said.

“Extra effort,” Van Horne said.

“Why (penalize) me?” Perry asked, laughing. “Everybody else was jumping on him.”

Payton lost the touchdown but averaged 6 yards on 22 other plays to net 132--his sixth straight 100-yard game, one short of the NFL record held by O.J. Simpson (1972-73) and Earl Campbell (1979).

“The difference was motivation. We wanted this more than they did,” said Payton, who went to 1,083 yards rushing for 1985--his ninth 1,000-yard season as a pro, an NFL record.

“I think everybody has pretty well accepted that Walter is the best back ever to play football,” said Van Horne, the former USC lineman who has been one of Payton’s bodyguards for the last five years.

This was a game that stirred up Texas. On a warm, cloudy day, would-be spectators were still trying unsuccessfully to find a scalper outside the stadium a half hour before the kickoff.

Inside, there were no no-shows. All 63,855 seats were occupied, most by Texans who judged that their team was playing for the home-field advantage in the playoffs.

Going in, the Cowboys were 7-3 and tied for first in the NFC East. They’ll still be up there if the New York Giants lose to Washington tonight. But if the Cowboys get to the playoffs, they won’t be seeing Chicago in Texas Stadium.

The Bears, who clinched first in the NFC Central Sunday, are a team apart.

For the second week in a row, they won handily without their quarterback, Jim McMahon, whose shoulder problem has been diagnosed as tendinitis. The doctors shot it with cortisone last week, but missed the troubled area, and McMahon couldn’t throw.

Fuller played well enough, considering that he was playing with Payton, Perry and one of the league’s toughest offensive lines. The farthest Fuller had to drive for a touchdown was 52 yards--and that only after Dallas had prudently given up.

The Cowboys were smashed by one of the better defensive teams in football. It’s a unique team, one that has a full measure of the three ingredients, talent, enthusiasm and coaching. There is unusual talent in almost every defensive position--with Dent, Perry, Steve McMichael and Dan Hampton up front plus All-Pro linebackers Otis Wilson and Mike Singletary and a secondary that improves each week.

The defensive coach, Buddy Ryan, manipulates these people so sagely that blitzing Chicago linebackers and safeties are often untouched until they touch the quarterback.

Wilson, for example, blitzed straight forward to twice knock out Dallas quarterback Danny White. After White regained his senses the first time, he returned for a few plays in the second half, then went off on a stretcher the next time Wilson sacked him.

The Cowboys said White’s injury, a stiff neck, isn’t likely to keep him out next week.

White was on the field for 1 1/2 quarters and part of the third quarter and threw the ball accurately most of the time. But he seemed to be handicapped by lack of receiving talent as well as the Chicago defense. And his replacement, Gary Hogeboom, fared worse, completing only 6 of 22 pass attempts for 60 yards.

White and Hogeboom were victimized by Chicago rushers or blitzers every minute Dallas was on offense. They were sacked six times, intercepted four times and hurried every time.

Perry said, “I was in the quarterback’s face a majority of the plays.” That may have been a slight overstatement of his role. But Dent, Wilson and McMichael spent much of the game in the Cowboys’ pocket. And on other occasions, as many as six Bears, including Perry, convened there at the same time.

Dallas Coach Tom Landry, figuring that his team couldn’t run from 24-0 behind, didn’t call a running play in the second quarter. Starting late in the first period, he called 20 straight passes, with these results: three interceptions, three sacks, nine incompletions, one penalty, two White completions and two by Hogeboom.

“We didn’t get anything going,” Landry said. “We didn’t play well. You can’t spot a team like Chicago two easy touchdowns.”