Key events
Commanders 3-14 Eagles, 3:43 left, 1st quarter (Barkley 4yd run)
Too, too easy. Barkley races to the right with virtually no opposition.
Commanders 3-7 Eagles, 4:14 left, 1st quarter: The Commanders’ new-ish defensive back, Marshon Lattimore, makes his presence felt by breaking up a pass. But the next pass is an easy 10-yard gain for Dallas Goedert.
Hurts has all day to throw, and DeVonta Smith makes a nice catch in bounds … or was he? The Eagles rush to the line and get another play off before the Commanders can challenge. That goes nowhere, but then AJ Brown makes a catch and zips past a hapless defensive back for another first down.
Ball on WAS 4.
Fumble to the Eagles
Good route across the middle, Dyami Brown is picking up good yardage, but Zack Baun punches the ball out of his hands and Reed Blankenship picks it up.
Just like that, Eagles take over on the WAS 48.
Commanders 3-7 Eagles, 6:19 left, 1st quarter: McCaffrey runs the kick back to the Washington 27. Ekeler picks up 4 yards. Daniels finds Ertz across the middle, just a hair shy of the first down. Robinson nets the rest.
First down Commanders on their own 39.
Commanders 3-7 Eagles, 7:39 left (Barkley 60yd run)
Well, that didn’t take long.
Rookie Will Shipley runs the kickoff back 35 yards to the Eagles 40. Barkley says, “Thanks very much,” and breaks about 20 tackles on his way to the end zone.
Slight exaggeration. Just know that many Commanders had a chance to stop him and did not. Jeremy Chinn in particular will be kicking himself.
In a nutshell, that’s why the Eagles are favored in this game. Also raises the question of why the Lions didn’t just pound the ball into the Commanders’ soft run defense all game last week.
Commanders 3-0 Eagles, 7:57 left, 1st quarter (Gonzalez 34yd field goal)
Zain Gonzalez, who doinked one off the uprights to win a shocker over Tampa Bay in the first round of the playoffs, puts this attempt straight down the middle from 34 yards out.
Commanders 0-0 Eagles, 8:30 left, 1st quarter: Handoff to Austin Ekeler this time for just 1 hard-fought yard. Daniels faces a tough pass rush and dishes the ball out to Jamison Crowder, but the one-time Duke player can’t scoop it off the ground. Long third down, and it’s a quick pass to Ekeler for 6 yards.
That’s fourth and 3. SURELY Quinn won’t go again …
Nope. Field goal try.
Commanders 0-0 Eagles, 9:50 left, 1st quarter: Back to Zacchaeus in the flat for 5 yards. Robinson drives through a pile for 3 more. Daniels again targets Zacchaeus, but the play is blown up in the backfield.
Dan Quinn wouldn’t go for it again, would he?
Yes he does.
Daniels back in the backfield, sees no one open, takes off … first down! Lost his shoe, moved the chains.
Commanders 0-0 Eagles, 10:58 left, 1st quarter: A good run by Brian Robinson picks up 5 yards, but two Daniels passes miss the mark – the latter almost defended well by Cooper DeJean. The Commanders make a habit of going for it on fourth down, but this is a bit too far.
Or is it?
No, it’s not, and Daniels finds Ertz for seven yards!
Commanders 0-0 Eagles, 12:16 left, 1st quarter: Another two wayward plays (pass batted away, short pass to tight end John Bates) brings up 3rd and 6 again. Daniels finds Zaccaheus short of the first-down line, but without a defender near him, he picks himself up and moves the chains again.
Commanders 0-0 Eagles, 13:31 left, 1st quarter: Daniels scrambles to avoid a sack and picks up a yard. A pass to former Eagles tight end Zach Ertz (husband of a veteran US women’s soccer player) picks up a couple of yards, and then McLaurin does well to dig out a low throw and pick up a first down.
Kickoff
Eagles win the toss and defer to the second half, so they’ll kickoff. Luke “not that one” McCaffrey bobbles the ball in the end zone but accepts the touchback.
Daniels takes the field …
ICYMI – former Commanders owner Dan Snyder, who presided over decades of unaccomplished football and off-field controversies, is apparently beside himself that the team has done so well without him.
The national anthem is being performed by a Broadway star wearing Eagles gear. Is that allowed?
An actual eagle is flying, taking a circuitous route to its handler but getting there eventually.
Both teams were on the field. No one was shown kneeling.
The last time these teams met …
Philadelphia jumped out to a 21-7 lead in the first quarter on a 68-yard run by Barkley. The Commanders cut it to seven by halftime, tightening up on defense and getting a 32-yard touchdown pass from Daniels to McLaurin.
The Eagles got two field goals for all the scoring in the third quarter, taking a 27-14 lead. But Washington answered with two TD passes for Olamide Zacchaeus for an improbable 28-27 advantage. Jake Elliott restored the Eagles’ lead with a 50-yard field goal, and after a rare Daniels interception, Elliott hit from 40 to make it 33-28 with 1:58 left.
Then came one of the best drives’ of Daniels’ young career. With six seconds left, he found Jamison Crowder in the end zone. Washington punched in a two-point conversion for a 36-33 win.
But the Eagles were missing QB Jalen Hurts in that game. The odds are against Washington repeating that success on the road, facing Hurts.
Or do they?
Yes. Yes, they do. This would be a substantial update. But the Commanders were big underdogs last week in Detroit, too.
From BlueSky:
“Beau – nice intro, and you’ve got me intrigued by a game that I wouldn’t usually pay a lot of attention to. I know I can find this out myself but could you add when it actually starts and when is it likely to finish? Cheers.”
The official time is 3 p.m. Eastern, or 19 minutes from now. The national anthem and coin toss may push that time back a bit.
It should be over by 6:15 p.m., unless we go into overtime, in which case we might be here until tomorrow. (But usually not.)
How do celebrities end up on the field crashing the pregame show?
Today, it’s Bradley Cooper. Coincidentally, I just ran through his duet with Lady Gaga in practice for an upcoming rehearsal.
Washington also has its share of celebrities, like … um … Dave Grohl? Sort of?
OK, Kevin Durant, sure. And … Matthew McConaughey? Mr. Texas?
And Taraji P. Henson.
This is what passes for trash talk in the genteel Mid-Atlantic/Northeast US …
Person 1: “lol waaay more people wearing Bills stuff than Commanders stuff at the Wegmans in DC today”
Person 2: “No Eagles? 🦅 At all, haha?”
Person 1: “They’re at the Wawa.”
For the record, the day the Wawa opened in my town was one of the happiest days since my kids were born.
The weather is …
… probably not a factor.
Currently 41 degrees Fahrenheit. In Celsius, that’s “meh, jacket weather.” Mild wind. Virtually no chance of rain, snow, hail, sleet, sneet, slail or any other wintry mix.
A zoo, you say?
One bright spot in the DC region recently – we have pandas again. They, at least, are enjoying the snow.
Yes, you can also yell at me on BlueSky.
Preamble
Hello from the penultimate wave of NFL games this season.
By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I live in Northern Virginia, just a couple of miles outside the Capital Beltway. But I won’t let proximity to one of these two teams sway my thinking today.
…
It’s just that it’s been a really difficult time in the DC metro area (or DMV, as we call it, prompting a lot of confusion with the Department of Motor Vehicles). It snowed weeks ago, and the ground is still an ugly combination of white snow and black exhaust. We’ve had all the chaos of a change in administration, there’s a lot of uncertainty … so, yeah. It might be nice for this area to experience some joy.
That said, these aren’t the Eagles that the rest of the NFC East is used to hating. There’s a lot of respect here for Saquon Barkley, who has been gracious about the NY Giants’ unfathomable decision to let him walk away. Coach Nick Sirianni also seems like one of the good guys in this oft-cantankerous league.
…
But wait … haven’t Commanders fans suffered enough? When did the Eagles last win it all? Seems like last week. The Commanders last won the Super Bowl in 1991. I was alive – in fact, that’s the year I graduated from college – but a lot of DC residents weren’t. Since then, the organization has been a model of futility and hostility.
Perhaps the future looks bright with Jayden Daniels wrapping up a rookie season for the ages. But Washington fans remember the last time a franchise QB came to town – Robert Griffin III, who blew up the league in 2012 but suffered from injuries for the rest of a short career that ended up the road in Baltimore.
So would it hurt anyone if the Commanders took a turn?
Oh … Barkley? Yeah, fair point. Like Terry McLaurin, Washington’s all-important wide received, he has served many years with a team that was mediocre or worse.
So there are a lot of rooting interests out there. Feel free to share yours by email. Or bobsled. Still frozen out there.
Beau will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s Graham Searles on the key matchups for today’s game:
What Washington need to do to win: The Commanders must maintain the improved level of defense they have achieved in these playoffs, while attempting to keep the ball out of Barkley’s hands as much as possible with a methodical, time-sapping run game. Washington forced only 17 turnovers in the regular season, but they generated five against the Lions last week and another against the Bucs in the wildcard round. Those turnovers led to three touchdowns.
Much like the defense, if Washington can gather the same production from running backs Brian Robinson Jr and Austin Ekeler as they did against Detroit, they will be difficult to stop. The pair combined for 128 rushing yards – just 17 short of their total from the previous three games. Steering the script away from needing explosive passing plays in the face of elite coverage from Quinyon Mitchell and Darius Slay is essential.
What Philadelphia need to do to win: Mea culpa. The Eagles do not need to pass the ball. In the wildcard round Jalen Hurts delivered the lowest chance of a passing attempt providing a positive outcome of any winning playoff team in the past 10 seasons. Last week, Hurts had 65 net passing yards, the lowest of any team in a postseason game in the past decade, win or lose. Unfortunately for Washington, with Barkley driving the Eagles offense the numbers matter little. When every ball the running back touches has the potential to go the length of the field, as long as Hurts doesn’t turn it over in between handoffs, Philadelphia have a mighty upper hand.
The snow and ice had their part to play in the lack of air yards last week. It will be Washington’s weak run defense that could leave them stagnant on Sunday. Detroit’s runners stacked up 201 yards and three touchdowns against the Commanders last week, the Eagles will expect Barkley to do something similar this weekend.
Key player for the Commanders: Jayden Daniels, quarterback. The rookie is the reason Washington have come from last in the NFC East in 2023 to the verge of the Super Bowl. He has shown an ability to lift his teammates’ level when it really matters. Take the lesser-spotted Dyami Brown. The receiver averaged 19 yards per game in the regular season; in the two playoff wins since, he has 187 yards while receiving more targets and outgaining Terry McLaurin. The Eagles will be nervous of throwing too much attention McLaurin’s way now Daniels has realised Brown’s potential.
Key player for the Eagles: Jalen Carter, defensive tackle. After leading a brutal onslaught on Matthew Stafford against the Rams last week, the pass rusher will be keen to show Daniels is not as immune to pressure as he appears. What could tip the scales is the injury to Washington’s right guard Sam Cosmi. Replacement offensive tackle Trent Scott will need help to stop the disruptive Carter.
You can read the full article here:
