PHILADELPHIA — For all of the hand-wringing about the Philadelphia Eagles during the first month of the NFL regular season; for all of the questions and concerns — that Nick Sirianni had lost his touch as head coach; that quarterback Jalen Hurts had regressed and that the passing game had real problems; that the defense lacked the impact pass rushers and game-changing defensive backs — the Eagles are right where they wanted and hoped to be.
Philadelphia outlasted the Los Angeles Rams 28-22 in a snow-covered affair at Lincoln Financial Field Sunday evening to secure a spot in next week’s NFC Championship Game.
Perfection continues to elude the Eagles, who as the highest remaining seed in the conference will host the Washington Commanders with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line. But perfection isn’t necessary to achieve championship goals. What the Eagles are is battle-tested. That much is clear after a season that featured a disjointed 2-2 start, a 10-game winning streak, the injury losses of key players, the maturation of young contributors pressed into larger roles, and the historic campaign of running back Saquon Barkley. Sunday’s divisional victory — a performance that seemingly encapsulated the 2024 campaign itself — drove home the point.
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Will the lessons, trials and tribulations of the season translate into victory over a red-hot Washington team and dazzling star quarterback Jayden Daniels? Philadelphia’s players and coaches have every reason to believe the answer is yes — and not because they’re discounting Washington. No, they have a healthy respect for their NFC East neighbors, with whom they split meetings this season. But the Eagles’ belief in themselves and their identity is just that strong after all they endured.
Sirianni always believed the road would lead the Eagles to this point. Confident in his philosophies, the approach taken by himself and his assistants, the roster construction executed by general manager Howie Roseman and the talent and makeup of his players, the fourth-year head coach never wavered, even though things seemed amiss during the first month of the season.
The Eagles had an early bye, in Week 5. Once they returned from that break, Philadelphia’s players said they observed an uptick in the demands of their coaches.
“It was the detail,” left tackle Jordan Mailata said after Sunday’s win over the Rams. “I’d say from the first four weeks, and then when we came back, we noticed a dramatic change in how the coaches were coaching — the detail when we came back from the bye week, and that carried over to individual drills, and on and on. So that was a major difference — game-changing difference.”
Said linebacker Josh Sweat: “Probably the biggest thing was the (focus on) tackling, because we had so many missed tackles, and we really got that corrected.”
Asked about the players’ assessments, Sirianni bristled a bit.
“I think we’ve been the same ever since we got here, to be quite honest with you,” he said. “Attention to detail has always been there, that accountability has always been there, the toughness has always been there, the togetherness has always been there. And so you just double down on those types of things.”
Whether the increase in demands was conscious or subconscious, the players observed a change, and it fueled them because they badly wanted to bounce back from a disappointing end to the 2023 season, when they lost five of their last six regular-season games and then got knocked out by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the wild-card round. They wanted to return to the Super Bowl after capping the 2022 season with a 38-35 loss in the game to the Kansas City Chiefs.
Leaders of the team actually approached Sirianni and lobbied for a heavier dose of offseason acquisition Saquon Barkley. With the passing attack on a roller-coaster of sorts, the running back become the pace-setter for Philadelphia’s offense.
“You got Saquon Barkley as your running back. You better f—ing use him,” Mailata recalled of the shift.
Barkley emerged from the bye rushing for 176 yards and a touchdown in Week 6 and went on to deliver an MVP-caliber season. He topped the 100-yard mark in nine of his 11 post-bye regular-season games and finished with 2,005 rushing yards.
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In embracing Barkley as the bell cow of the offense, the Eagles leaned more heavily into the identity that Roseman envisioned as he constructed this team. Yes, Philadelphia boasts impact wide receivers A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, and a dual-threat quarterback in Hurts. But the Eagles have always invested heavily in their offensive line, and that line is among the most imposing road-grading units in the league. Pounding the football is a point of pride for them, especially because of the payoff Barkley offers.
“It’s so much fun blocking for him. We know if he can get past the line of scrimmage untouched, if we can make sure he gets by untouched, he’s gone,” Mailata said of Barkley, who this season has scored on five rushing touchdowns of 60 yards or longer.
The Eagles also began winning in the trenches on defense, as young stars like Jalen Carter gained comfort in new coordinator Vic Fangio’s system. After giving up far too many yards and big plays early in the season, Philadelphia’s defense became one of the stingier units in the league.
“Jalen Carter is a special player and he’s done so many of the right things to continue to make himself a special player,” Sirianni said. “Can’t say enough about (Fangio) and the job he does of putting him in positions to succeed. … (Carter) has consistently done the right things in and out of the building, from his conditioning to his weight to his style of play.”
Eagles defensive tackle Jalen Carter pressures Rams QB Matthew Stafford on Sunday. (Mitchell Leff / Getty Images)
It was fitting Sunday that as snow blanketed the surface at Lincoln Financial, hampering the effectiveness of the passing attack, the Eagles’ ground game and defensive front carried the team to victory.
Of course Barkley delivered haymakers in the form of a 62-yard touchdown run in the first quarter and a 78-yard touchdown run in the fourth at a time when Hurts was less effective while hobbled by a knee injury. Barkley accounted for 232 yards of offense — 205 rushing, 27 receiving — and two touchdowns on a day when Hurts managed only 128 passing yards.
Of course Carter delivered two soul-crushing sacks and forced a fumble while fellow pass-rusher Nolan Smith forced another, with both takeaways coming in the second half.
Now the Eagles find themselves one win away from their second Super Bowl appearance in three seasons, appreciative of the moment and hungrier than ever to reach their full potential.
“Two-and-2 seems like a long time ago,” Sirianni said. “We embraced the adversity. We’re battle-tested from some of the things that we went through last year. We had to drag ourselves through the mud, through the early starts and a lot of the doubts. And now here we are right now, but that’s the way football goes. That’s the way life goes. And hopefully these guys are learning … through the ups and downs, you can pick yourself up and go again.”
(Photo of Jalen Hurts and Saquon Barkley: Sarah Stier / Getty Images)
