Eagles 'Calmly' Inch Closer to Playoffs with Comeback Win over WFT
Landover, MD - The Eagles are one of the hottest teams in the NFL, thanks to a 20-16 comeback win over the Washington Football Team at FedExField in Week 17.
Winners of four straight to get to 9-7, Philadelphia outscored the WFT 13-0 in the second half after falling behind in the early going.
Jalen Hurts was very effective at quarterback, the Miles Sanders-less running game wasn't as explosive but picked up the Eagles when they needed it, and the defense turned from soft to smothering in the second half with Rodney McLeod punctuating the win with a diving interception of Taylor Heinicke in the end zone with 24 seconds left.
THE BULLS:
FOURTH DOWN FRENZY -The Eagles entered the day last in the NFL in fourth-down conversion rate at 29 percent and started their offensive day with a failed fourth-and-two on an inside handoff to Jordan Howard out a shotgun look despite the fact he was limited most of the week with a stinger injury.
To Nick Sirianni's credit, he kept plugging away and both of Boston Scott's short TD runs came on fourth downs and another that kept churning the clock late. If the coach had gotten spooked and taken gimme field goals the Eagles would have been in some trouble.
RUN GAME MINUS MILES - It wasn't great early but when the Eagles' finally got the lead, the running game showed up and it's always impressive to move the chains when the opposition knows you want to run it. Scott finished with 47 yards on 14 carries with the two scores and Howard churned for 26 on 11 carries. Statistically not good but efficient when needed.
GO-GO GOEDERT - Dallas Goedert continues to dominate in the passing game, snaring six of seven targets against Washington for 71 yards. Whenever Jalen Hurts needed a play in the passing game Goedert was there.
JOSH SWEAT THE TRAINWRECKER- Jonathan Gannon calls dominant defensive performances train-wrecking games and Sweat was the guy on Sunday. The lengthy DE was a playmaking machine with 1.5 sacks, a tackle for loss, two hurries, and two pass breakups at the line of scrimmage.
Taylor Heinicke is going to be seeing Sweat in his sleep.
THE BEARS:
HALFTIME HIJINX - The Eagles tried to ice big-footed kicker Joey Slye with time running down in the first half on a 55-yard field-goal attempt. You never know in these situations how early the kicker knows the timeout is coming but Slye was wide right on a practice kick and the real deal was right down Broadway.
QB THERMOMETER - The Eagles' defense hasn't seen a competent QB in quite some time and while Taylor Heinicke isn't Dak Prescott never mind Patrick Mahomes or Aaron Rodgers he's leaps and bounds better than the Jake Fromms and Garrett Gilberts of the world.
Heinicke finished 14-of-17 for 170 yards in the first half harkening back to the 80- or 90-percent completion percentages earlier in the season.
The Eagles claimed they didn't tweak much in the second half, just executed better but it's going to be interesting to see this team against a good QB again for a full 60 minutes.
MORE: Rodney McLeod's End-Zone Interception Seals Nail-Biting Win over Washington
-John McMullen contributes Eagles coverage for SI.com's EagleMaven and is the NFL Insider for JAKIB Media. You can listen to John, alongside legendary sports-talk host Jody McDonald every morning from 8-10 on ‘Birds 365,” streaming live on both PhillyVoice.com and YouTube. John is also the host of his own show "Extending the Play" on AM1490 in South Jersey. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen
Ed Kracz is the publisher of SI.com’s Eagle Maven and co-host of the Eagles Unfiltered Podcast. Check out the latest Eagles news at www.SI.com/NFL/Eagles or www.eaglemaven.com and please follow him on Twitter: @kracze.
