MUST BE DREAMING: TEMPLE IS 9-2?
Each week, Daily News football writer Paul Domowitch will tell you the things he will be keeping his eyes on during that week’s game:
1. Making Campbell Soup: Redskins quarterback Jason Campbell was benched in the second half last week, but will start tonight. He’s protected by a wobbly offensive line that’s missing two of its best blockers, LT Chris Samuels and RG Randy Thomas. The Panthers sacked Campbell five times a couple weeks ago. Ready or not, here comes the Eagles’ blitz.
2. How do you spell run, Andy?: Running backs Brian Westbrook and LeSean McCoy had just 11 rushing attempts last week as Reid called a whopping 54 passing plays. Against a defense that is third in the league against the pass and sixth in sacks per pass play, he might want to try to strike a little better balance.
3. Third-down improvement: The Eagles converted just 2 of 16 third-down opportunities against the Raiders last week. Twelve of those 16 third-down situations were six yards or more. Against a Redskins pass rush that has 11 sacks in its last 3 games, the Eagles need to reduce the number of third-and-longs so that the run is at least an option, if not a consideration.
4. Many happy returns: The Redskins’ coverage units are very good. They’re fourth in the league in both punt and kickoff coverage. The Redskins’ defense doesn’t give up many long drives. So the Eagles really need PR DeSean Jackson and KR Quintin Demps to shorten the field a bit.
5. The Eagles’ offensive line: This unit played awful last week. Worse than awful. They couldn’t protect Donovan McNabb and didn’t do a very good job of run-blocking. They finally may get LG Todd Herremans back, which should help.
ZORN'S NEW ROLE
Washington head coach Jim Zorn will not call the plays for the first time in his 23-game tenure as head coach, instead overseeing the Sherms -- Lewis, the new play-caller, and Smith, the offensive coordinator.
"It's going to be very easy," Zorn told the Washington Post. "Here's what I'm going to do: I'm going to support the guy calling plays. And then in between the series, we'll be communicating and I'll be communicating to him, and then we'll start working on the plan for the next series.
"I'll be talking to the players. There's a lot to do. I'll be attentive to what I have to do while our offense is on the sideline. Because when you're a play-caller, you're concentrating. ... I'm just going to keep quiet" about play-calling.
Les Bowen has covered the Eagles for the Daily News since 2002. Before that, he spent nearly 13 years covering the Flyers. It took Les only a few seasons after the switch to figure out that there was no penalty box at the Linc, and that the time really wasn't his, despite what Andy Reid kept saying. Les came to Philadelphia and the Daily News from Charlotte in 1983. In the intervening years, he has pretty much lost track of NASCAR, and his accent. He, his wife Barbara, and their two sons live in Haddon Township, New Jersey.
Paul Domowitch has been with the Daily News since 1982. He has spent most of his 27 years at the paper covering the Eagles and pro football. For the last 10 years, he’s been a selector for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. A native of Wilkes-Barre and a graduate of Wilkes University, Domo came to the Daily News from the Fort Worth (Tx.) Star-Telegram, where he covered some god-awful Texas Ranger baseball teams. His first beat at the Daily News actually wa s boxing, which he covered just long enough to lose two sports coats to blood spatter before moving on to football. Domo and his wife Shelley, a University of Oklahoma grad and very dangerous to be around following a Sooner loss, have been married 29 years and have raised 2 terrific daughters – Allison, 26, a lawyer and graduate of Boston University School of Law; and Amy, 23, who graduated from Clemson and works in marketing and sales for a professional baseball team.
