Quoting Obama, Childress told reporters in Minnesota, "Our destiny won't be written for us, it will be written by us."

Profound, yes, but it's also a fitting metaphor to indicate how all things Chicago have crept inside the Vikings' heads this week.

Besides guaranteeing the Bears a winning season, Monday night's 20-17 overtime victory over the Packers put the playoff pressure squarely on the shoulders of the Vikings come Sunday. The Bears have none.

"They have to feel it now because we won," said Bears defensive end Alex Brown, one of Monday's heroes.

The Vikings still own the advantage in all NFC North tiebreakers. But you don't have to be swept up in Chicago's Football frenzy to see the Bears carry a psychological edge over Minnesota into Week 17.

Every game-time decision will cause Childress to rethink whether it might be used as evidence to fire him if the Vikings come within one victory of the playoffs -- again.

Every carry just got a little harder to handle for fumble-prone running back Adrian Peterson. Every pass just got a little harder to aim for newbie quarterback Tarvaris Jackson, who hasn't played in a game this big.

In four games after Dec. 17 over the last two seasons, all with playoff implications, the Vikings are 1-3. Think that might come up a few times over hot cocoa this week? Around Minneapolis, the only thing heavier than the burden the Vikings feel this week might be the snowfall.

Meanwhile, the Bears are 3-0 in December and will go back to practice Wednesday feeling like a team kissed by fate after winning back-to-back games in overtime. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the last NFL team to pull that off also did it at Soldier Field, in 2001, when the Bears beat San Francisco and Cleveland in succession.

The Bears had enough fluky things go their way that season to get into the playoffs, and it's fair and natural to wonder if a similar pattern is developing.

Consider that in both overtime victories, neither opposing quarterback took the field in the extra period because the Bears won the toss and ultimately the game on the first possession. Thank you, NFL rule book.

Fittingly, the Bears won the coin flip when it bounced fortuitously off Brian Urlacher's helmet. It was the most heads-up play of the night for Urlacher.

When the Bears reported to Bourbonnais five months ago Wednesday, most honest souls at training camp would have acknowledged being thrilled by the prospect of this season coming down to the final Sunday. Now they want more.

"It's like when Lovie pointed out at halftime how far we had come so we can't let it get away now," Tommie Harris said.

To make sure it doesn't, they must correct flaws. They can't be fooled into thinking a good record means everything is fixed. The Bears beating the Packers didn't change the fact the Packers largely outplayed them.

As good as the special teams were in bailing out the Bears, two goofs in the kicking game nearly propelled the Packers to victory: the fake punt that fooled only the 11 guys on defense and a poorly executed pooch kickoff with 3:16 left that the Packers returned to midfield.

Kyle Orton gave fans and the front office every reason to doubt him with another late-season clunker: a 48.7 passer rating with two bad interceptions.

He has regressed, and not all of it can be blamed on the receivers.

The running game stalled until the Bears got the ball back five plays after Orton's second interception and basically put the game in Matt Forte's hands with 7 minutes 14 seconds left.

Not that doing so warmed the hearts of freezing Bears fans: Forte had 12 carries for 24 yards at that point.

But in the fourth quarter and overtime, his 11 carries went for 49 yards.

And when the Bears faced fourth-and-1 at the Green Bay 4 with the season on the line, they didn't hand the ball to the fullback or call an ill-advised play-action pass.

They stuck it in the belly of their best player, who delivered.

As for signature victories of the Bears' 2008 season, this was typically sloppy and hard to read -- yet indelible. It defined a team full of flaws and resiliency, a team that appears to have learned from its own late-game mistakes earlier in the season how to finish in the fourth quarter or beyond.

It promised the last Sunday of the regular season will be as exciting as the first. "All you ask for in life is a chance," Brown said. "We have one."

Don't worry about Giants coach Tom Coughlin ruining that chance by giving the Vikings anything but the best the defending Super Bowl champs have to offer. Coughlin wouldn't mess around with the integrity of a playoff race by not trying to beat the Vikings.

"There's a lot to be gained," Coughlin told reporters in New York. "If you believe, as we do, you have to be playing your best Football at this time of year, you certainly have some things to build on, particularly when you're not going to play for a couple of weeks."

The way things have gone for the Bears lately, nobody would be surprised if they still are playing then too.

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Playoff push

Here are the scenarios under which the Bears can make the playoffs:

NFC North title (No. 3 seed)

*Win at Houston AND Vikings lose/tie vs. Giants

*Tie Texans AND Vikings lose to Giants

Wild-card berth (No. 6 seed)

(assumes a Vikings win)

*Beat Texans AND Cowboys lose/tie at Eagles AND Bucs lose/tie vs. Raiders

*Tie Texans AND Cowboys and Bucs both lose

dhaugh@tribune.com