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John Smallwood | Cole helps keep Peterson in check
he made the type of impact plays that help win ballgames.
It started early, when the
YONG KIM/Daily News
Defensive end Trent Cole sacks Vikings' Kelly Holcomb in first quarter.
Vikings recovered an onside kick after taking a 7-0 lead on their first drive.
With the sold-out crowd at the Metrodome rocking, Cole got by McKinnie and dropped Vikings starting quarterback Kelly Holcomb for a momentum-killing, 9-yard sack.
Two plays later, Minnesota, which started the drive near
midfield, punted.
"I don't know what to tell you," said Cole, who now has nine sacks on the season. "You have to be a natural pass-rusher and get it done.
"It's also practice and preparation that starts from the offseason and through camps and into games."
Preparation was also what led to Cole's huge tackle-for-loss of the dynamic Peterson.
The Eagles knew the key to
victory was containing Peterson.
"We knew we just had to keep our containment, clog up the middle, not make mistakes on blitzes and we could keep [Peterson] contained," Cole said. "He is a hard runner. I'm not going to lie. He's one of the best runners I've seen. He's fast, keeps
pumping his legs and that's
why he breaks a lot of tackles."
But during the game, Cole
noticed a trend about Peterson that he first noted while watching film.
"From watching the film, I saw that Peterson cuts back a lot," Cole said. "Every time he takes one step forward and stops, he's going to go outside. I saw it the whole game.
"If he takes one step, he's not going to want to run inside. If he's going to run inside, he's
going to wait until a hole opens up."
So when Cole broke through the line of scrimmage and saw Peterson stop, he knew how to react.
