Williams agrees that he’s made major strides.

“I feel that I’ve grown tremendously so far this year and it’s exciting to see,” he said. “That [passing yards] record was more or less the growth that I’ve had. That’s where I’ve been at, that’s where my mindset’s been at, and then at this moment, it’s at an all-time high for myself of confidence.

“I’m going to go into the game that way. I’m going to bring energy this week for the guys and bring the urgency because that’s what we need.”

Williams has excelled in big games at every level. As a sophomore quarterback at Gonzaga High School in Washington, D.C. in 2018, he accounted for all seven of his team’s touchdowns in a 46-43 conference championship win over DeMatha, capped by a 53-yard TD on a Hail Mary as time expired.

As an Oklahoma freshman in 2021, he replaced Spencer Rattler trailing Texas 35-17 in the second quarter and rallied the Sooners to a 55-48 win in the Red River Rivalry, passing for 212 yards and two TDs and rushing for 88 yards and one TD.

In the most important Bears game he’s played to date, Williams helped turn a 16-6 deficit into a thrilling 22-16 win over the Packers Dec. 20 at Soldier Field by engineering three straight scoring drives in the final 2:00 of regulation and overtime, capped by a walk-off 46-yard TD pass to DJ Moore.

“I think I am built for these moments, mentality-wise, how I’ve worked,” Williams said. “I’ve been in a bunch of big games before and a bunch of big rival games. In those moments, I think I can provide a spark for the team. I think I can do whatever my team needs me to do, whether that’s stand in the pocket, whether that’s run, whether that’s scramble, whether that’s whatever, hand the ball off 30 times and be energetic about it. Whatever it takes is where I’m at, where I’m going to be at for these next couple of weeks hopefully.”

The win over Green Bay was the sixth that Williams and the Bears have recorded this season after trailing in the final 2:00 of regulation, the most by any team in one year since at least the 1970 NFL/AFL merger.

“We’re never out [of a game]; our guys know that,” Johnson said. “We certainly don’t want to have to lean into that each and every week. We’d like to start off a little bit faster and make it more of a complete game for 60 minutes.

“But teams understand when they play us now that they have to earn it. They have to really close us out of it if they want the victory because we can score points in bunches. We can do it in a short amount of time, and we’ve proven that.”

Tight end Cole Kmet believes that Williams has always possessed a clutch gene.

“I think that’s something he’s just been born with,” Kmet said. “He’s got great poise out there, and he remains the same. He understands, especially this year, when he has to go make a play when it’s needed, and we’ve seen that come up time and time again.”