Another Meadowlands miracle unlikely for Eagles this season

The Eagles wasted no time tagging the Giants' shiny new football palace.

For more than three decades, the place across the parking lot from MetLife Stadium was haunted by the ghostly image of Herm Edwards' scooping up Joe Pisarcik's inconceivable fumble and scooting for an impossible game-winning touchdown. The Eagles never set foot in Giants Stadium again without the original Miracle of the Meadowlands coming to mind.

It stood as the emotional backdrop for every big Eagles moment there, from Clyde Simmons' rumbling for a game-winning touchdown with a blocked Eagles field goal to Brian Westbrook's incredible punt return to win a game in 2003. The Eagles won more games than any other visiting team in that place.

It cost about $1.6 billion to build the gleaming, ghost-free new stadium. And in their first meeting there, the Eagles gave the Giants a fresh new scar. After falling behind, 31-10, early in the fourth quarter, the Eagles staged a furious comeback, scoring three touchdowns to tie the game. With scant seconds left, the Giants were forced to punt the ball one last time.

You know the rest. Punter Matt Dodge inexplicably kicked the ball right to DeSean Jackson. The Eagles' scintillating little big man raced 65 yards to give the Eagles a 38-31 victory as time expired. They scored four touchdowns in less than nine minutes to take a one-game lead in the NFC East race and send the Giants spinning toward another late-season swoon.

That play will be on everyone's mind Sunday night when the Eagles return to the Meadowlands. But instead of haunting the Giants, that comeback and all it represented will weigh more heavily on the Eagles.

It will be a bitter reminder of when the Eagles were the kind of team that could summon a fourth-quarter comeback and win a hard-fought game. It will stand as a high-water mark for a team that has been slipping backward ever since. That comeback will haunt the Eagles because, instead of being a launching pad toward greatness, it turned out to be a mirage.

The three-plus quarters that preceded the comeback have proven to be a more accurate glimpse of these Eagles: Michael Vick completed 13 of 20 passes for 87 yards, a touchdown, and an interception, and was sacked three times. Jeremy Maclin fumbled the ball away. The defense allowed four touchdown passes and couldn't get off the field on third downs.

After Jackson tossed the football into the stands that afternoon, the Eagles lost their last two regular-season games and a wild-card playoff against Green Bay - all at home. They have won just three games this season, blowing fourth-quarter leads in five of their six losses.

How bad is it? This bad: If the Eagles were to manage more Meadowlands magic and win, it would improve their record to just 4-6. They would still be two full games behind the Giants in the NFC East race. There would still be six teams ahead of them in the wild-card hunt, including three that hold a tiebreaker edge for beating the Eagles.

How bad? This bad: If the Eagles were to play as they did against Dallas three weeks ago, which would almost surely result in a win, it would serve mostly to frustrate and infuriate their fans even more. How can a team be that good one week and so wretched the next?

Without Vick, who broke two ribs last week, Vince Young will make his first start for the Eagles. He will lead them against a Giants defense that is merely average, but is motivated to seal the Eagles' miserable fate.

Young is an intriguing wild card in all this. No matter what comes of his so-far disappointing NFL career, he will always be the author of one of the greatest individual performances in the history of football. It was Young who willed Texas to that unforgettable victory over USC in the 2006 Rose Bowl, Young who accounted for two touchdowns in the final seven minutes for a 41-38 win and the national title.

As Tim Tebow is proving (however unconventionally) out in Denver, it is possible for a single player to take that kind of command of a game in the NFL. Tebow has made the fourth quarter his personal showcase over the last few weeks.

Vick, meanwhile, has had the ball in his hands for potential game-winning or game-tying drives in the final minutes of four of the Eagles' losses. He has come up short each time, throwing two interceptions and two doomed passes to Maclin - one fumbled away and one short of a first down.

The Eagles' fourth-quarter magic was last seen in the Meadowlands in December. Maybe they can find it there again. Too bad it probably won't matter.