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SAN FRANCISCO - Sometimes you need more than the numbers to understand the full capacity of what has happened.
Sometimes you just have to be there.
This was one of those times and the truth is there was a large contingent of Eagles fans in attendance yesterday at Candlestick Park for a sunny afternoon of twists and turns that ended with a loud celebration in the visiting locker room as the Eagles' players watched the division rival Dallas Cowboys lose in Arizona.
"This is huge," Eagles guard Todd Herremans said after his team scored the game's final 23 points and escaped with a 40-26 victory over the San Francisco 49ers. "Being 3-3 is astronomically better than 2-4. We know we're a good team. We just have to play. Now everybody can get rested up during this bye week and we can come back balling."
With Dallas losing in Arizona and the Washington Redskins somehow falling at home to the St. Louis Rams, it turned out to be a beautiful day for the Eagles. They're 3-3 and the two NFC East rivals that already beat them are now 4-2.
The season no longer seems lost.
"I think this is a turning point," running back Correll Buckhalter said after contributing a career-high 178 total yards and a touchdown. "The last couple weeks we had found a way to lose, but today we found a way to win. The guys pulled together and nobody got down on themselves."
This was a game filled with turning points and the man who had the most to say about the outcome was Eagles defensive end Juqua Parker.
With the Eagles down by nine points late in the third quarter, quarterback Donovan McNabb threw a pass that was intercepted by former teammate Takeo Spikes at the 49ers' 12-yard line.
At that point, the Eagles appeared to be in real danger of dropping their third straight and going into their bye in a 2-4 hole.
That's when Parker and the defense stepped in. After Brodrick Bunkley stopped Frank Gore for no gain on first down and Asante Samuel stepped in to break up a J.T. O'Sullivan pass on second down, Parker busted through for a 9-yard sack that forced Andy Lee to punt from the back of the end zone.
The low line drive kick was scooped up by Greg Lewis and returned to the 49ers' 38-yard line.
After McNabb completed a 17-yard pass to DeSean Jackson on first down and Buckhalter rumbled for 15 yards on the next play, the Eagles eventually found themselves faced with a third-and-one situation from the two. It was a similar circumstance to the ones that faced two weeks ago when they lost in Chicago and last week during their home loss to the Redskins.
This time, the Eagles opted to throw the football and McNabb found a tightly covered L.J. Smith, who caught the football for a touchdown.
"I was just thinking that we really had to score," Smith said. "It was definitely crucial because we had struggled previously in the red zone. I was like the third or fourth read on that. I saw him throw it and I saw the defender and it looked like he was going to hit it. I've dropped a ball like that in the past where I thought the guy was going to hit it and I didn't expect it. It kind of slipped a little bit and I just closed my legs."
The defense followed by forcing another three-and-out with linebacker Omar Gaither pulling down tight end Vernon Davis for a 7-yard loss on a third-down pass play.
Thanks to a 9-yard return by Jackson, the Eagles started at their own 49. A 9-yard run by Buckhalter and an 18-yard screen to the running back got the Eagles down to the 24 and they eventually settled for a too-close-for-comfort 38-yard field goal by David Akers that allowed the Eagles to regain the lead.
From there, this game was all about Parker.
"We wanted to make a change when we were in the game," Parker said. "We stepped up really big."
After busting through the line of scrimmage to tackle tight end Delanie Walker for a 10-yard loss that put the 49ers in an impossible third-and-18 situation, safety Quintin Mikell came up with an interception of O'Sullivan that he returned 41 yards to the San Francisco 7-yard line.
Another Akers field goal made it 30-26 and, by that point, Parker and the Eagles' defense had become so dominant that a four-point lead was like a 40-point lead.
On the 49ers' next offensive series, Trent Cole karate-chopped O'Sullivan's arm on a third-and-three play and forced a fumble that was recovered by Chris Clemons at the San Francisco 20.
Another field goal made it 33-26 with 1:14 remaining.
The 49ers briefly made it interesting when O'Sullivan connected for a 25-yard pass to rookie Josh Morgan at the 50-yard line, but Parker hid in the weeds on the next play and came up with an interception that he returned 55 yards for a game-sealing touchdown.
"I just thought the defensive line upped its game," coach Andy Reid said. "I thought we just started playing the game on their side of the ball."
The Eagles pretty much dominated the first half and stunningly only had a one-point lead to show for it.
Two things happened to make their fine work disappear on the scoreboard.
The first was a 53-yard field goal by Joe Nedney with 29 seconds left in the first half that cut the Eagles' lead to 17-9. The kick just cleared the crossbar.
With all three timeouts remaining, McNabb and the Eagles' offense moved from their own 20 to the San Francisco 36, leaving one second left for Akers to attempt a 54-yard field goal.
Akers had hit from well beyond that distance in warmups, but this kick had no chance because the offensive line allowed Ray McDonald to come crashing through to block the attempt.
Former Eagles cornerback Donald Strickland picked up the ball in stride and raced into the end zone for a touchdown that pulled the 49ers within a point at halftime.
That momentum-changing sequence carried over into the second half, too as the 49ers scored the first nine points of the second half to take a nine-point lead.
But the Eagles survived to celebrate a much-needed victory.
"This game didn't really show all that we can do on the field, but it did show that we can overcome adversity," McNabb said. "We knew going into the game that we were better than our 2-3 record. Today, we took a baby step toward turning our season around and becoming a playoff contender."
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