Canal Street Chronicles
Sunday marked the beginning of the 2025 NFL regular season for the New Orleans Saints with a visit from the Arizona Cardinals in the Caesars Superdome. Here’s a quick recap of all the action in the Saints’ first game under head coach Kellen Moore.
Each team’s first possession was fruitless, with Cam Jordan recording the first sack of the new season to help force a quick punt by Arizona before a short Alvin Kamara run, coupled with a pair of incomplete passes from quarterback Spencer Rattler on his first two throws of the afternoon, resulted in the Saints punting the ball right back.
The ensuing Cardinals’ drive was stop-and-start as the referees began throwing flags, though the visitors found enough yardage through a Kyler Murray scramble and a 12-yard run from James Conner to get themselves into field goal range. Chad Ryland kicked one through from 42 yards for the game’s first score.
Rattler returned to the field looking for a response, which he instantly found. Completions to Juwan Johnson and Chris Olave had the Saints into Cardinals territory before an illegal shift penalty on Olave pushed the offense back.
Kendre Miller would then have an impressive run to recover the lost yards, but a holding penalty on Cesar Ruiz pushed the Saints back once more.
Rattler followed that up with a home-run shot to Rashid Shaheed that was intercepted, but was bailed out by a penalty away from the play by Max Melton.
Despite more penalties, the black and gold eventually got deeper into Cardinals territory with runs from Kamara and a 12-yard connection from Rattler to Brandin Cooks as the quarter came to an end with the visitors up 3-0.
A short connection with Kamara got the second quarter underway and moved the Saints into the red zone. Kamara would then break out for an 18-yard run to the house, scoring the first touchdown of the new season and putting the Saints on top 7-3 after Blake Grupe kicked through the extra point.
The ensuing Cardinals drive was defined by Marvin Harrison Jr, who picked up the bulk of the drive’s yardage on a 45-yard connection with Murray. Harrison Jr was soon found again in the end zone, and the extra point restored a 3-point advantage for Arizona at 10-7.
The Saints offense returned to the field and responded once more. Rattler connected thrice with Olave, once with Johnson, and both Kendre Miller and Devin Neal made good progress on the ground to move the black and gold near the red zone. After coming up short on a third down, though, it was Grupe who came out to knock through a 36-yard kick and tie the game at 10-10.
Murray and the Cardinals offense returned to the field and kicked into gear. A 25-yard reception from Trey McBride was the highlight of a drive that went 71 yards in under 5 minutes, finished by a short throw to James Conner that restored...
