Wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk had a season-high 45 receiving yards on four catches in the San Francisco 49ers' 33-22 victory over the Chicago Bears. The win helped snap a four-game losing streak and improved the team's record to 3-4.
The performance pales in comparison to Deebo Samuel's 171 receiving yards, but given the "slump" that the second-year receiver has been in this season, it was nice to see Aiyuk contribute more.
"I don't know what his numbers were or anything, but B.A. played his butt off today," head coach Kyle Shanahan said. "He was great. I knew he had a chance going into the game. He's strung together a number of good weeks here, and I felt like this was the main week where his game really went up in practice, where he gave me a lot of confidence throughout the week, gave the quarterbacks a lot of confidence, our team. And I could feel it from him all week, and I felt it today. So, big props to B.A. today."
Shanahan was asked if today's game was Aiyuk's best of the season, to which he responded, "Yeah, definitely."
Aiyuk told reporters that today's victory was the most fun he's had in a while. Like his coach, the receiver also felt he had a good week of practice heading into this weekend. He also admitted to having an improved mindset.
"So, I think that was it, just taking that into a week of practice," Aiyuk said, "even starting last week, rolling into this [past] week, and just continuing to roll throughout the week, and then it's easy on Sundays."
Everyone predicted a big season from Aiyuk following his impressive 60-catch, 748-yard, and five-touchdown rookie campaign. However, his start to the 2021 season has been underwhelming. That led to a lot of media speculation as to the reasons.
"It could be a bunch of different reasons," Aiyuk said. "All I know is I control what I can, control the controllable. And that's even in the blocking game. That's even [when] somebody else has the ball, somebody else running the ball, somebody else catching the ball, controlling my part. Usually, stuff trends in the right direction when I do that.
"I don't really get too caught up in that. We got a win today. That doesn't really matter at all to me as long as we see Ws."
Might today's performance be a springboard toward Aiyuk and Samuel being a dangerous NFL tandem, as many predicted they would be this season?
"Of course," Aiyuk responded. "No matter what happens after a week, I see it like that all the time. I see it like I could have no catches, no targets, I still go into the next week, expecting that, preparing for that."
Aiyuk's wide receiver teammate loved seeing him making plays in Chicago.
"It was great," Samuel said. "He had two great weeks of practice, so we kind of knew, coming into this game, Brandon was going to go out there, and have a great game, and do the things he needed to do. Kyle believed in him, just as well as everybody else on the offense, and he just went out there and performed well."