CHICAGO -- They might have left themselves too little time to rally and reach the playoffs. Perhaps they just figured it out a bit late. But that thing the Chicago Bears did to the Dallas Cowboys on Monday night is the new formula; it's what the Bears have to be now. Butkus and Singletary ain't walking through that door. It's an entirely new day, a Bears team we've never ever seen before. Ever. Throw the damn ball, son. Throw it to Marshall, throw it to Jeffery, throw it to Bennett, and that other Bennett, too. Lob it over the crazed pass-rushing linemen to Forte, if you want, or even Bush.

The Bears scored 45 points and pulled up on the Cowboys late in the fourth quarter. They scored 45 points with no defensive takeaways; 45 without Devin Hester taking one to the house; 45 points even though the quarterback couldn't feel his toes because it was 8 degrees when the game started, minus-10 factoring in the wind chill. The Bears scored 45 points on their own, throwing and running like, well, the 49ers or Patriots or Chargers. They scored on eight consecutive possessions. The Bears' punter didn't once punt. Maybe he'll thaw by Thursday.

Running back Matt Forte went over the 1,000-yard mark for the season with his second consecutive 100-yard outing. Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune/MCT/Getty Images

If what happened Monday bears no resemblance to the Bears of your daddy and granddaddy and his daddy, so be it. None of Papa Bear's teams, none of Coach Ditka's teams, no Bears team ever had the offensive weapons Marc Trestman has. And finally, on the second Monday night of December, he took the restrictor plate off. The Vikings and Lions before them would have gone down the same way, but maybe Trestman had to figure this out himself, in his own sweet time. But there's no going back now; there had better not be. Each of the remaining three games is going to be just like the Dallas game, which is to say a "must win" if the Bears are to take the NFC North and reach the playoffs. And each game, very likely, will have to be won the same way the Bears beat Dallas, which is to say by attacking the opposing defense as if it's a video game.

"This," Julius Peppers said, "is what we can be." Truth is, it's what the Bears have to be. The defense has too many players out with injuries to stop anybody -- couldn't stop DeMarco Murray on Monday night. He ran like Adrian Peterson did last week: 18 carries for 146 yards, an average of 8.1 yards per carry. You know how the Bears have to play defense the rest of this season? With great offense. They held the ball nearly 37 minutes while Dallas had it only 23 minutes. The Bears offense kept Tony Romo off the field to the point he was only out there long enough to throw 20 passes. "Our offense made it much, much easier for us," Peppers said of the defense. The Bears converted 8 of 11 third downs, 73 percent of them. That's Tom Brady, Peyton Manning-land. Matt Forte rushed for 100 yards again. Josh McCown was great again: 27-of-36 for 348 yards, four touchdowns, no interceptions and one bodacious touchdown run. McCown's passer rating? A stellar 141.9. If this is relief pitching, McCown is threatening to turn into Mariano Rivera.

So, the question becomes, can the Bears do this next week in Cleveland, the week after in Philly and the final Sunday of the season back home against the Packers? The answer, probably, is yes because there's no way to stop the players they throw at defenses. Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffery, quite simply, form the best receiver tandem in the NFL. Each averaged nearly 17 yards a catch against the Cowboys. Marshall now has 84 receptions for 1,090 yards and nine touchdowns, while Jeffery has 75 catches for 1,193 yards and six touchdowns. They're too big, too fast, too strong and too good (thank you Stacy King) for anybody to guard. If you double them both, McCown is quite happy to find Martellus Bennett (53 catches, 588 yards and five touchdowns) or Forte (65 catches for 518 yards in addition to 1,073 rushing yards and nine touchdowns total).

As a group, they're too good in open space, too good after the catch, too diverse in talent for today's neutered defenses to counter. And Jeffery is becoming a wonder, the way he sticks his mitts up and snatches passes away from defenders like his hands have some sort of vacuum suction. The touchdown Jeffery caught at the end of the second quarter, which really seemed to demoralize the Cowboys, is the kind of play that's going to drive the Browns' defensive coaches crazy all week. Jeffery is turning into a monster, which only makes Marshall more difficult to defend, which only opens up running room for Forte, who'll be looking at safeties 20 yards down the field, which keeps defenses from being able to tee off on the quarterback, in this case McCown, who keeps doing and saying all the right things about being the backup while playing just a shade behind Nick Foles.