Crossing Broad
For the third time in eight seasons, the Eagles are going to the Super Bowl. In each of those instances, they’ve throttled their NFC Championship Game opponent by at least three scores, this time dispatching the rival Washington Commanders 55 to 23 on Sunday evening in South Philly.
Factoid aside, this wasn’t the same type of wall-to-wall beatdown the Birds put on Minnesota and San Francisco. They missed a field goal, blew a two-point conversion, and had some brain farts throughout. They weren’t truly able to put the Commies away until the 12:24 mark of the fourth quarter, despite having a +3 turnover margin at that point, which was mostly due to Jayden Daniels playing well and keeping his team in it. But at the end of the day, Kellen Moore’s offense could not be stopped and Vic Fangio’s defense made significant, game-changing plays throughout. Washington’s rookie QB could have played a perfect game and still would have lost.
The most satisfying thing about this one was the performance of one Jalen Alexander Hurts, who was rolled up last week and the topic of myriad questions about both his physical health and passing ability. He finished 20 for 28 for 246 yards and a TD, and ran for 16 yards and three scores, two from the shove. It’s gonna be a long two weeks for the national media, who now have to come up with new Hurts talking points ahead of the Super Bowl, since they can’t talk about the passing game any longer.
Oh yeah, Saquon Barkley had three touchdowns on 15 carries. He only touched it 16 times in the biggest game of his career and logged 124 yards. It feels like everyone on the roster made a play at some point on Sunday, and that’s the sign of a Super Bowl contender, which most Eagles fans started to realize in mid-October. This is a special team and they have one more game to win.
LET’S GO! TO THE SUPER BOWL!…
…AND TO THE OBSERVATIONS! –
1) There was some pregame confusion about whether or not Cam Jurgens was going to play. He ended up being listed as active, and was announced as one of six offensive line starters over the stadium PA, but did not play, with Landon Dickerson sliding over to center and Tyler Steen coming in at left guard. Dickerson looked like he was going through war in this game, hobbling around on the sideline, running multiple tush pushes, and trying to run a clean offense while clearly not being 100%. The Eagles gave up a sack on the third drive that forced a long field goal, and there looked like some confusion in protection before that. There was a touchdown called back because of a holding call against him, but otherwise he got the job done until Jurgens surprisingly came in to start the second half. It was all downhill from there.
RE: Steen, one false start on the third drive, but a clean...
