Eagles Settle for 23-23 Tie with Bengals
PHILADELPHIA – The winless Eagles hoped the winless Cincinnati Bengals would be the life preserver they would need as they brace for choppy waters over the next three weeks.
Instead, the Eagles find themselves drowning.
They didn’t lose, but they didn’t win, either. They instead settled for a 23-23 tie.
It may as well be a loss with looming road games in San Francisco on Sunday night followed by a trip to Pittsburgh then a home date with the Ravens. It is a very real possibility this team is staring at 0-5-1.
"I am not happy about it," said Eagles DE Brandon Graham, who had two of the Eagles eight sacks, with Derek Barnett also getting two sacks. "...I look at it that we have a lot of work to do, but at the end of the day, we are going to stay together. I am not really worried about it.
"I know the Bengals were going to come in and they were going to fight. Every team we match up against, they are going to fight. There are no easy wins and no easy games. I just love that we stuck together through all the stuff that happened. We just messed up in the end. We can’t do that.”
The last time the Eagles played a tie game was, ironically, in 2008 against the Bengals when the game, played in Cincinnati, ended 13-13.
Yes, the NFC East is no great shakes 12 years later, but the Eagles (0-2-1) look more like a team that can contend for a top-10 draft pick than a second straight division title.
At least the Eagles avoided their first 0-3 start since 1999, when their head coach, Doug Pederson, was the starting quarterback while the team’s first-round draft pick in that spring, Donovan McNabb, learned the ropes.
“Just not a smart football team right now and that’s on me and we’ll get that fixed as we get ready for this next week,” said head coach Doug Pederson. “I like how our team battled, hung in there, came back to tie the game at the end, but just overall not very smart (Sunday), not very disciplined when those are some of the things we talk about quite a bit.”
The Eagles were all set to attempt a 59-yard Jake Elliott field goal with seconds left in overtime, but Matt Pryor was called for a false start penalty, backing the home team up five yards. Rather than try a 64-yard field goal, where a miss would have given the Bengals good field position and just about in position to try their own field goal for the win, the Eagles punted.
Quarterback Carson Wentz willed the Eagles to this tie.
Trailing 23-16 with 3:06 to play in the game, Wentz drove the Eagles 75 yards for a touchdown.
Along the way, he ran for a first down not shying away from tacklers on a third-and-six, breaking off nine yards to the Cincinnati 19. Then it was Wentz who refused to be denied again on a second-and-goal from the 7. He rolled to his right, but no receiver was open, so he took off and dove the final handful of yards into the end zone.
Rather than attempt a two-point conversion for the potential victory, head coach Doug Pederson played it safe and sent Elliott in for the PAT with 28 seconds to play in regulation.
Wentz struggled with his arm, though it would be difficult to quibble over his heart.
He threw two more interceptions and now has thrown to in each game this year. His six picks are one away from the total he threw all of last year. Wentz also fumbled, though Jason Kelce was able to recover it.
"The first one I felt good about, the ball gets tipped at the line," said Wentz about his first pick. "It's a bad feeling when you're back there and you see the ball flutter through the air because it was tipped at the line of scrimmage. The guy made a good play.
"The other one I got aggressive there trying to get one in there to (Zach) Ertz and the guy made a good play. that's something I have to be better with."
The quarterback ended with 29 completions in 47 attempts for 225 yards and a passer rating of 62.8. He had a 29-yard touchdown pass to Greg Ward with 16 seconds left in the first half that gave Philadelphia a 13-10 lead at the break. It was Wentz’s 100th career TD pass.
The Eagles ran 36 times for 175 yards. The Bengals (0-2-1) were giving up an average of 185 yards on the ground in the first two games.
The Eagles lost tight end Dallas Goedert to an ankle injury in the first quarter and receiver DeSean Jackson in the second quarter to a hamstring injury. Cornerback Avonte Maddox left in the third quarter with an ankle injury.
None of the three players returned.
"It is hard when you have some moving pieces and you have different guys in there, but we’re not going to make excuses for anything," said Pederson. "We have to continue to practice, we have to continue to get better and sort these things out. When the injuries piled up, it got us a little bit out of our game plan rhythm."
Without Goedert, Ertz was targeted 10 times and he made seven catches for 70 yards. Greg Ward led all Eagles receivers with eight receptions for 72 yards and a touchdown. Both totals for Ward are a career-high.
Miles Sanders had 95 yards for the second straight week, doing it on 18 carries this week compared to 20 last week against the Rams. Wentz had 65 yards on nine carries.
Rookie QB Joe Burrow was 31-for-44 for 312 yards and two touchdowns, both to rookie receiver Tee Higgins. Burrow’s PR was 105.0.
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