Miraculously, improbable run continues for the Birds
PHILADELPHIA >> Having just won their final game of the regular season, the Eagles marched into their FedEx Field locker room, slammed the door and waited for the usual. Moments later, the usual happened. Moments later, something fortunate went their way.
“We needed some help,” Doug Pederson said. All teams do. So when the Chicago Bears won a game 1,118 miles way in Minneapolis, the Eagles were back in the playoffs. And from the other side of those closed doors, it was easy to hear the hooting and the hollering. The exhales, though, were muffled.
Great teams make their own luck. At least they put themselves in position to benefit from good fortune. That’s what the Eagles did in Week 17, winning in Washington, giving themselves a chance to drag their world championship status through another postseason. They did their part. So they were rewarded. It’s how it all works.
The question just might be impolite. Still, it shall be asked: How long can it work that way?
When these, the greatest hours in their Super Bowl Era history are over, and that can happen at any time, the Eagles will roll into history as great, noble champions. They won one championship and have jammed themselves in a position to win another mostly because of their self-confidence and courage. They have had the guts to run trick plays. They are disinclined to punt. They snarl and growl and give rude hand signals to opponents when they lose. Doug Pederson’s book was entitled, “Fearless.” Perfect.
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Yet somewhere in that flurry has been an unlikely bounty of breaks. Yes, there has been. And the New Orleans Saints, for one jilted team, know that.
“We would have beaten the bleep out of the Eagles,” Saints running back Alvin Kamara has been quoted as saying, “if we played them in the NFC Championship Game.”
The Saints didn’t play the Eagles for the last conference championship for one reason: A play that has leaked into football lore as the Minnesota Miracle … emphasis on miracle. That’s when, with time expiring in the conference semifinals last winter, Vikings quarterback Case Keenum, because he had no remaining choice, hurled a 27-yard desperation pass into a prevent defense and saw Stefon Diggs leap to catch it. And as New Orleans defenders toppled like bowling pins, Diggs race untouched to complete a 61-yard touchdown play good for a 29-24 victory. With that, the Eagles would face Keenum, not presumptive Hall of Famer Drew Brees, for a spot in the Super Bowl. Miracle?
Seemed that way.
But the Eagles took advantage, bombarded the Vikings, 38-7, and strolled off to the Super Bowl in Minneapolis for Minnesota Miracle II. There, on a night when Tom Brady would throw for 500 yards, they would win on a Zach Ertz reception that was not officially ruled a touchdown until replay officials did a lengthy, frame-by-frame, forensic film study. Did Ertz deserve to score? Ah. Sure. But was it close enough to have been ruled the other way? Ah. Sure.
Somewhere, though, Kamara was seething. His problem. The Saints had their chance. They lost. The Eagles had their chance. They won. By design, parity has given the NFL its frighteningly high popularity. The Eagles don’t have to apologize for that. But they do have to brace for the snap-back.
So Sunday they will go to New Orleans, where they already fell, 48-7, this season, Kamara’s chest out after having supplied a late, rub-it-in touchdown. All week, the Eagles’ chorus, with Pederson waving the baton, has been chanting that it will be different this time.
“You still have to have a belief that we can get it done,” Pederson said. “The players do believe. They just come to work every day ready to go. There’s great leadership on the team. It’s really kind of held us together and pulled us through this stretch. Guys really understood what we needed to do and came together.
“They’ve jelled. And here we are today.”
The Eagles are underdogs against the Saints. They prefer that, it seems. If prodded, they will even wear dog masks. Circle them with enough live cameras, and barking might ensue. But they are true underdogs this time. Vegas came out firing, making New Orleans a nine-point favorite. The Eagles will be playing on the road for the fifth time in six games. Even against the legendary Patriots in the Super Bowl, the Birds were only five-point underdogs, albeit on a neutral field.
Yet the Eagles were underdogs last week, too. And they were on the road. And they won on, yes, on something of a miracle when Cody Parkey’s would-be gamewinning field goal was brushed by Treyvon Hester and, on a windless January day in Chicago, hit the upright, then the crossbar, then the ground on the proper side of the crossbar, for the Eagles’ purposes.
The Eagles have had their challenges in the last two years. They keep losing their preferred quarterback to injury. They are playing this season without key weapons Jay Ajayi and Corey Clement. Jason Peters, a likely Hall of Famer, was injured and missed the Super Bowl run. Jordan Hicks, too. And maybe the franchise was due for some luck, after decades of either playing in, or Andy Reid coaching in, a fog.
But don’t deny it: Whether it has been Julio Jones being unable to catch a game-winning touchdown pass in the end zone, Tom Brady dropping a touchdown pass but Nick Foles catching one, or teams losing games thousands of miles away, they have been on a fortunate roll. And if that can continue Sunday, it just may never end.