Entering final showdown, Eagles hope for brand New Year
PHILADELPHIA >> The game was over, the humiliation seemingly complete.
How else to characterize the Eagles’ 48-7 loss in New Orleans on Nov. 18?
“An embarrassing one,” then-starting quarterback Carson Wentz offered.
A blowout of depressing proportion which left the defending champions wallowing at 4-6, their playoff dreams seemingly sunk before the gales of November had really kicked in. And yes, more than just this nearly historic loss, it was giveback games to Tennessee and Carolina earlier in the season –not to mention a still-mystifying loss in Tampa in Week 2 – that threatened doom for the defending chumps.
Yet, as Doug Pederson was asked to recount Friday, he came off that Superdome field five weeks ago still believing in the dream of repeating ... or at least earning the chance to do so. Four wins through 10 weeks and appearing dead amid a 41-point loss? Believe?
“I did, I did,” Pederson repeated enthusiastically. “When you look at the games remaining and where we were, I just think that that game, as a setback game, as it was from the standpoint of the score and how we felt and some of the injuries coming out of that game, I still felt like we were in control of the NFC East.”
What a feeling, even if it was a hollow one. For it was the Dallas Cowboys who would go on to hold control of the NFC East, made possible by a Dec. 9 overtime win over an Eagles team that in the space of three weeks had not only left its embarrassment behind, but somehow had lit a spark to extend its season.
Wins over the Giants and Redskins had followed that New Orleans debacle before a Sunday Night showdown in Dallas resulted in what should have been a crushing 29-23 overtime loss.
Yet while it set the stage for the Cowboys to clinch the division, it also became the only Eagles loss over a five-game stretch since the Nightmare on Bourbon Street.
Hence the Eagles approach a last regular season game Sunday in Washington with eyes wide open and a smallish yet intriguing chance to make the playoffs.
An Eagles road win via reborn (yet again) Nick Foles over a Redskins team that ditched the season weeks ago, and a Bears road win over the 8-6-1 Vikings, yet another team that had upset the Eagles earlier in the season. That’s what it takes for the Eagles to make the playoffs.
A second season for a team that finally seems to be cruising in stride after consecutive wins over 10-win teams? It really does seem possible now, even if the oddsmakers would still bet against it.
But maybe they aren’t listening to the voice of coaching optimism.
“Guys really hung together,” Pederson said of the atmosphere post-NOLa. “It could have spiraled at that point and it didn’t. I think that’s the one thing that I’m the most proud of coming out of this season right now. Just looking at that moment and how things went positive for us instead of the other way.”
It couldn’t have been easy, especially since, just as they were the previous glorious season, the Birds were hit hard by injuries, and thus struggled on a weekly basis to fill holes. That as especially true in the secondary.
It was there, with the likes of De’Vante Bausby, Deiondre’ Hall and Cre’Von LeBlanc coming into the lineup through various desperate pathways, that the absences were seen and felt most.
All carried cool apostrophes but little name recognition.
Others joined them. Most eventually caught on and filled in impressively in recent weeks. Now the team is getting healthier, and more confident than ever coming off a 4-1 stretch that includes consecutive victories over 10-win playoff contenders.
None of that matters in the upcoming final game, however.
“At the end of the day we have to win this game if we want anything to happen,” said lineman Lane Johnson. “That’s where we’re at and it’s unfortunate we’re in this position, but it is what it is and we have to deal with it.
“It all starts with beating Washington. If we don’t accomplish that, there is no hope. So that’s where we’re at. We all know what’s in front of us and we’ll try to focus on what we can.”