Eagles vs. Buccaneers Wild Card: Five Things to Watch, Score Prediction

Despite a third straight trip to the playoffs, Philadelphia Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni may need to beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to save his job.
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TAMPA – They aren’t the same teams they were when they played back on Sept. 25 when they were both 2-0.

Since then, the Philadelphia Eagles have gone 9-6 to end at 11-6 while the Tampa Bay Buccaneers went 7-8 to end their season at 9-8, though they have played well down the stretch.

The Bucs, though, won the NFC South and that is why they will host the Eagles, who fumbled away their chance at winning the NFC East after controlling it for most of the season and are in the postseason as the first wild-card team.

The Eagles beat the Bucs 25-11, the first time an NFL game ended in that bizarre score, and it ended up being the Eagles’ largest margin of victory all season.

“People who aren’t in the trenches right now will say, ‘Hey, we dominated them the first time, we can do it again,’” said left tackle Jordan Mailata. “No man, it doesn’t work like that, not in the NFL. That’s what I’ve learned the last couple of years, especially playing in the playoffs, it’s a whole new beast. 

"You have to give respect to both sides, but you have to go out there and earn it. It will be fun.”

Kickoff is set for 8 p.m. on ESPN.

It is the third straight postseason trip for Philly, all in the three years that head coach Nick Sirianni has been at the helm. Yet, Sirianni could be in a win-or-be-fired situation as rumors continue to circle like vultures that a loss and he may be replaced.

devonta smith bucs 3
© Nathan Ray Seebeck, USA TODAY

Here are five things to watch:

Eagles receivers. The Eagles will be without their top offensive player, receiver A.J. Brown (knee), so DeVonta Smith will need to step up his game. 

The Bucs will know this and will likely pay plenty of attention to Smith, who missed the Week 18 finale with an ankle injury, so it will be incumbent on the “other” pass-catchers such as Quez Watkins, Olamide Zaccheaus, Julio Jones, and, perhaps, Britain Covey.

“We know what A.J. brings to the table,” said Zaccheaus, “but at the same time we’re going to go out there with who’s available and we’ve got to make it happen. I just think at the end of the day it’s about winning. Whatever that looks like we need to go out and give it our all.”

Added Covey: “I trust Julio, I trust Smitty, Quez always feels like he has something to prove. OZ is one of the best guys. And you know me. I’ve already got a chip on my shoulder. I trust us.”

Jalen Hurts. The quarterback didn’t start throwing until Friday’s practice after suffering a dislocated middle finger on his throwing hand last week. He was crisp with his throws, and he made them all – short, intermediate, and deep – which was a good sign.

“Jalen had a good practice (on Friday),” said Sirianni on Saturday. “Obviously, everyone's going to be fighting through things, he's fighting through the finger injury, but he had a good practice so excited for him and this opportunity. Really excited.”

Run game. The teams may not be the same, but the Eagles logged 40 runs to gain 201 yards on the ground with D’Andre Swift leading the way with 130 and an 8.1 yards per carry average. With Brown out, Hurts’ finger a potential issue, the run game should be leaned on heavily, and Mailata agrees.

“We have to win a game and running the ball’s going to win the game,” he said. “It’s going to help set up everything. If we can’t execute in the run game, we’ll be forced to pass the ball, so we have to be on our A game. It starts with us.

“We always say that, but if we don’t get that run game going and don’t focus on executing our technique, especially with the multiple fronts Todd Bowles has, then we’re going to be in for a long night.”

Blitz control. Todd Bowles is going to send the proverbial kitchen sink at Hurts. The Eagles have struggled with it and Tampa is good at it, blitzing at the third-highest rate (40 percent) in the NFL.

The Eagles better figure it out quickly. So bad they were at it last week in their drubbing by the New York Giants.

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“I think a lot of that comes down to execution, and everyone really being on the same page,” said Hurts about the blitz. “You gotta take advantage of what they’re giving you and take advantage of the opportunities that are there. So, we’ll prepare and come up with a good plan, and it comes down to executing.”

Playoff juice. Will the Eagles have it? Can they dispel any talk of a locker room fracture? It’s now or never for them.

“The energy and the juice in this building (Saturday) of being here and in the playoffs again, we’re really excited,” said Siriani. “We can't wait. We can't wait to be in this game against a really good opponent. You play a long season to get to this moment right here. And we're really excited to go.”

Prediction: My predictions have struggled as much as the Eagles, but I will take them one last time – unless they win – and I think they will:

Eagles 27, Bucs 25

Season record: 9-8


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Ed Kracz
ED KRACZ

Ed Kracz has been covering the Eagles full-time for over a decade and has written about Philadelphia sports since 1996. He wrote about the Phillies in the 2008 and 2009 World Series, the Flyers in their 2010 Stanely Cup playoff run to the finals, and was in Minnesota when the Eagles secured their first-ever Super Bowl win in 2017. Ed has received multiple writing awards as a sports journalist, including several top-five finishes in the Associated Press Sports Editors awards.