Bear Necessities: Matt Eberflus explains why he didn’t challenge Isaiah Coulter catch

Why didn’t Bears HC Matt Eberflus throw the challenge flag on the Isaiah Coulter catch? Eberflus explains:

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The Chicago Bears defeated the Seattle Seahawks 27-11 on Thursday night to advance to 2-0 in the preseason. It was a dominant effort on all phases for Chicago. But it was far from perfect, including for head coach Matt Eberflus, who’s learning on the job.

While Eberflus has been solid in these first two preseason games, there was one missed opportunity for Eberflus in the first half of Thursday’s game.

Facing third-and-8 from their 33-yard line, Bears quarterback Trevor Siemian got control of a high snap and managed to get off a pass to wide receiver Isaiah Coulter for an impressive first-down conversion. But the catch was ruled incomplete.

Upon replay on TV, it was abundantly clear that Coulter had managed to haul in the ball for the completion. So it was a shock that Eberflus didn’t throw the challenge flag.

Eberflus explained why he didn’t throw the challenge flag on the play.

“A couple coaches on the sideline thought it bounced on the ground,” Eberflus said. “We got one good look upstairs, and that was it. We didn’t have a second look at it, so we just decided to let it go.”

With that in mind, Eberflus said that, had it been a regular season game, that things would’ve been different.

“In real time, in a real game, maybe I would’ve thrown (the challenge flag),” Eberflus said. “But we didn’t have the second look.”

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