For a moment Wednesday, Chicago Bears head coach Ben Johnson paused his team’s preparation for Sunday’s game against the Las Vegas Raiders to acknowledge a major achievement.

Johnson announced in front of the entire team during a meeting that quarterback Caleb Williams had been named the NFC Offensive Player of the Week for Week 3. He became the first Bears player to win the honor in two years and the first quarterback to earn it in three seasons.

But Williams wasn’t in the mood to celebrate Wednesday. He already moved on to figure out a way to beat the Raiders and continue his growth in Johnson’s system.

“It’s Wednesday now,” Williams told reporters Wednesday at Halas Hall in Lake Forest. “And it’s time to move on and focus on the Raiders and obviously we have a tall task at hand with, like we talked about, with [Raiders defensive end] Maxx [Crosby] and those defensive players and obviously that explosive offense and guys on special teams. We have a tall task at hand. Every week is important. Every game. Every moment. That was a good moment we had Sunday and it’s time to move on to the Raiders.”

Williams’ honor came after he had made steady improvement since the start of the season. He matched a career-high Sunday when he threw four touchdown passes to four receivers. Williams also threw a season-high 298 yards against the Cowboys and had his highest completion rate at 67.9%.

But true improvement can be confirmed with a simple eye test.

Williams looked the most comfortable he has all season with everything he did Sunday. His offensive line didn’t allow a sack for the first time in his career, which allowed him to sit in the pocket for most of the game.

He said the consistency he had in his footwork kept him in rhythm with his throws, which helped him spread the ball to his playmakers. Williams also had an effective handle on the pre-snap process, leading to no pre-snap penalties for the first time this year.

“That’s the most important thing,” Williams said. “I know a lot of football is results-based. But that’s not, I think I’ve spoken to y’all about it, that’s not really where I am at. There are going to be times where you feel you play a great game and you weren’t doing the right things at the right time, and you end up losing the game. So just being able to do the right things at the right time consistently helps the team. And that’s where I’m at and trying to be at.”

Johnson has seen the same growth compared to where Williams was during the spring. He said Williams has used his feet more and is trying to tie the timing of his first progression to his first target, his second progression to his second target, and so on.

Plenty of people have played a role in Williams’ development up to this point. Johnson credited the coaching staff and backup quarterbacks Tyson Bagent and Case Keenum with helping Williams make progress. But Williams also has put in the work to improve steadily.

Johnson said Williams has studied his mistakes diligently to make sure they don’t happen again. The Bears don’t have to waste time going over the same thing, which has allowed Johnson to load more into the game plan this week than he did for Week 1.

“Hopefully that’s our new normal here going forward, ... not just for him but the entire offense, we can have a little bit more in the game plan to attack some of these defenses,” Johnson said. “Because he’s doing that and his comfort level is growing, we’re able to grow as an offense.”

The learning off the field for Williams has come from understanding more about himself and Johnson. Williams said it’s important to get into a flow and understand what works for him when it comes to learning. It’s also critical to understand what Johnson is looking for in a play.

Once Williams gets that down, it comes down to patience from both himself and Johnson to get it ready for Sunday.

“There are going to be hard moments in practice like today,” Williams said. “It’s Wednesday. It’s probably one of the hardest days of a quarterback’s job is Wednesday because all of the game plan that’s going in. So just being able to be positive, being able to understand that it is Wednesday and a bunch of it is new and not get too frustrated and give myself a little grace on Wednesdays to be able to understand I’ll go back [and] study tonight, study tomorrow and keep studying throughout the week, and then we’ll get to Sunday and be able to rep it and get out there and call those plays and be efficient and do whatever we need to do to win the game.”

Williams will have a chance to show what he’s learned and take another step in his development Sunday.

“We have a tall task at hand. Every week is important. Every game. Every moment. That was a good moment we had Sunday and it’s time to move on to the Raiders.”

—  Caleb Williams, Chicago Bears quarterback

Although there will be plenty of Bears fans in attendance in Las Vegas, Williams will need to prove that he can replicate his performance against the Cowboys on the road. He likely won’t have a clean pocket either with Crosby trying to get him.

That’s why he didn’t have too much to celebrate Wednesday.

“He’s already on to the next game,” Johnson said. “He knows he needs to have an even better performance here this week to give us the best chance to win.