Eagles master the art of survival
Eagles 19, Giants 17. That is what it said on the scoreboard. It is hard to explain how close it came to not happening.
Eagles master the art of survival
Rich Hofmann, Daily News Sports Columnist
Well, that was simple enough.
Eagles 19, Giants 17. That is what it said on the scoreboard. It is hard to explain how close it came to not happening.
Twice, pass interference penalties prolonged the Giants’ final drive of the fourth quarter. One, on Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, was justified. The other, on Nnamdi Asomugha, was invented by the man who threw the flag. And then a third pass interference call, this time on Giants receiver Ramses Barden, was also called. New refs, same as the old refs.
After all of the laundry was picked up and all of the yards were added and subtracted, here was the situation: Giants kicker Lawrence Tynes was looking at a 54-yarder with 15 seconds remaining to win the game.
Snap, hold, kick.
Wide left.
Pandemonium at Lincoln Financial Field. But then the whistles were blowing and the striped arms were waving. The Eagles had called timeout before the kick. Tynes was going to get another try, and Eagles coach Andy Reid was going to be forever tarred by this newest adventure in clock management.
So, again.
Snap, hold, kick.
Short.
This time, the pandemonium was justified. The Eagles are now 3-1 and their defense, which had played so well for the first 3 1/2 quarters, was let off the hook.
The Eagles didn’t used to be able to play this kind of game. They weren’t good enough on defense to even think about pulling it off. They were too easy to run on, too prone to mistakes. For too long, they were built to win shootouts and nothing but shootouts -- you know, last team with the ball wins.
But on Sunday night, deep into the second quarter, the scoreboard was not lying when it said Eagles 0, Giants 0. And at halftime, it was Eagles 7, Giants 3. The yards were hard to come by, and the hitting was a notch above normal, and both offenses approached the whole business with a significant amount of caution.
The Eagles’ offense, in recent years, has not been all that interested in caution. It has been designed to be explosive instead. There are probably a dozen reason why Reid and Marty Mornhinweg don’t like running the ball but, in the last couple of years, one of them was that they always seemed to feel the need to score more points, to build a bigger cushion, because the defense could not be trusted to hold.
But this was the year that the defense was going to prove it could be trusted. This was the year and this was the game -- and then it all blew up one one drive in the fourth quarter, one drive where they couldn’t seem to do anything right, where they found themselves out of position at times and suckered by play action at others, where Giants quarterback Eli Manning carved them up and put the Giants in front, 17-16, on a 6-yard pass to Bear Pascoe.
It knocked them back. It raised all of the old questions. But Michael Vick gave the defense another life with a late scoring drive that began at the Eagles’ 17-yard line. A 25-yard Alex Henery field goal with 1:49 remaining put the Eagles back in front, 19-17.
And then came the circus -- of flags and timeouts and 54-yarders that were no good in the night.
We are fixated on the Eagles’ offense, just because. We speculate endlessly about Vick, and the run-pass ratio, and blitz pickup, and on and on. By contrast, the defense had become something of an afterthought. It was just assumed that they were going to be undersized, and that they would try to make up for that with speed, and that they were going to give up a ton of yards on the ground, and that they were going to hope to hang on for dear life in most games.
So, after this one, there will be a lot of conversation about how Reid and Mornhinweg stuck with the running game in the second half, despite LeSean McCoy having only 2 yards on six carries at the intermission. It will be a valid conversation, too -- because McCoy did explode in the second half.
But it needs to be stated prominently that perhaps the main reason the Eagles stuck with the run was because they were able to stick with the run. They stuck with it because they had a 7-3 lead at the half, and then a 10-3 lead, and then a 13-10 lead, and then a 16-10 lead.
And, despite everything, the defense did hold on in the end. Barely.
I will never get using the timeout to "ice" the kicker. Has it ever worked? Lucky it didn't come back to haunt them. That said, a nice win. It doesn't matter how good it looks; it is a win.— phillyinsd- Woo Hoo! 3-1, and first place! Let the trolls start the negative comments... Defense was solid, and the offense was good enough.— dlscholt
Despite Reid's redzone incompetence and his blundering timeout, this was the best game I have seen in a long time. Edge of my seat thriller. Howard Eskin, I would kiss your toupee.- Mastering the art of survival is absurd. This team could very well be 0-4 save for the fact that they have gotten extremely lucky. With regard to the offensive pass interference call, that is what is known as a make-up call considering the refs essentially had given the game to the Giants on the pass interference against Nnamdi.— Bluegrass Funk
- Message to DRC: show some discipline! And lose the Batman outfits and green mohawks...this is a contract year, remember?
Seriously, if he wants to make Nnamdi money, then he needs to show that his head is in the game. He made some bonehead mistakes in this game. The pick he had was nice, but I am worried about his game discipline. His pass interference penalty should have cost us the game. Remember the first preseason game when he launched himself at Byron Leftwich's head for no reason?
The Giants were dumb not to run the ball a couple of times and set up a makeable field goal.
Props to VICK for leading another 4th quarter game-winning drive.— EmanuelP - It feels like a 1-3 team but by the hair of our chinny-chin-chin we are 3-1. Who can figure this season on a tightrope— fafink
- Bluegrass Funk: If my uncle was a women, he'd be my aunt.— p-diddy
- Exactly! You are what your record says you are. Plain and simple. This year's team finds a way to win. Last year's team found a way to lose.
- Does Howard Eskin wear a Toup?
— fingerskevin - If AR had mismanaged the clock like Coughlin did (not calling his TOs before the 2 minute warning), he'd be getting crushed right now. Fortunate win (like all 3 thus far this season), but a win is a win I guess. Just hope we're not using all the good mojo too early.— vdstrading
- All the flags at the end of the game were too exciting. I have to take extra blood pressure meds now.— phillyguy36
- Yes we all got over stimulated. The giants must feel snakebit. They cannot beat the Eagles, no matter what they do. Eagles were big underdogs like many of the games we have won against them. Great play calling and hat's off to Starship 7. He played like the QB we thought we had 2 yrs ago. what a great feeling to beat those hated Giants. that I think we can all agree on.
- Anyone else go completely insane when NBC blared that ridiculous SALSA music because Victor Cruz scored a TD?! I just about lost my mind. Or how about when they crew was giving a huge shout-out to the historic cheese steak shop in town, and Al Michaels had to add his two cents with his rude, "oh well I'll take a nice big juicy New York Dog over that any day" comment. NBC has officially lost my viewership for anything period with their ridiculous bias during the game. How bout at the end of the game, "Well they'll be talking about that OPI for days to come" as if the ref blew a call, when anyone with eyes can see Nnamdi get pulled down by his face mask. But knowing the "FANS" in here, most of you probably thought that it was the wrong call too. Typical.— papabear702
- Yes, I was incensed at the bias displayed by NBC. I expect that out of ESPN, which I don't watch any more because of all of their biases, but a national broadcast needs to have a touch more integrity than that. — Penfold18
- Get used to it. My username comes from the fact that I was working in NYC for 14 years, and am finally back home in Philly the past two years.
NYC is literally HELL ON EARTH, but the people from there, who live there, have no sense of objectivity, cannot see how ludicrous their lives are, and how insane their city is. I could go on and on, provide example after example, just rest assured we live in a Paradise compared to the NYC idiots, who would never, could never, get Philadelphia.
As to the game, it was a nail-biter, and I was ready to strangle Andy Reid on that TO, but I think the Karma is Eagle's biased this year. By the way, not showing the Dawkins speech at halftime, shows you what NBC is, a NYC based conglomerate, otherwise known as General Electric.
