The Bears didn't get blown out by the Packers on Sunday, but that doesn't matter to John Fox's team.
Inside the home locker room at Soldier Field, the Bears don't have any room for moral victories or "almosts."
"I guess to the outside world, it's a plus to play Green Bay relatively close, right?" Bears veteran linebacker Jared Allen said. "But for us — at least for me — it's just not good enough. That's the bottom line."
The Bears led the Packers 13-10 at halftime Sunday and entered the fourth quarter down just one point (17-16) before a pair of touchdown drives from Aaron Rodgers and the Packers put the game in hand for Green Bay.
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It was a far cry from the blowout losses (38-17 at home in Week 4, 55-14 at Lambeau Field in Week 10) the Bears suffered at the hands of the Packers last season.
"I'm not one for moral victories," Allen said. "We lost the game; we didn't play well enough to win it. We had opportunities to win it. Especially in the second half.
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"Yeah, there's always stuff to build off of and they're a good team, but I feel like if you got the lead in the second half, you gotta close it out. We just didn't close it out."
The Bears came out with the mindset that they were going to "shock the world" and beat the Packers in front of their home crowd.
Bears new head coach Fox and defensive coordinator Vic Fangio had a solid plan in place to throw all kinds of various, creative looks to throw Aaron Rodgers off his game.
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Rodgers finished with only 189 yards and given how close the game was most of the afternoon, the Bears admitted they were left with a bad taste in their mouth when the final whistle blew.
"You give (the Packers) respect, but we're trying to win the division," Allen said. "We're trying to do things.
"At the end of the day, if you told me we held Aaron under 200 yards and we lost, I probably would've lost that bet. There's positives, but at the end of the day, we're judged by our wins and losses.
"It's unfortunate. I really thought there was an opportunity to get up 1-0 in the division. But we didn't, so you move on. It's only one game; you got 15 left."