Oh boy. The Gardner Minshew-led Philadelphia Eagles fell to the Dallas Cowboys on Saturday night, losing by a final tally of 40-34 and putting their record at 13-2 going into next week’s game with the New Orleans Saints. It also keeps the Eagles one win away from locking up the NFC’s top playoff seed and everything that comes with it: homefield advantage throughout the postseason, plus a lucrative wild-card round bye week.
And, yeah, the Eagles are going to receive a 2023 first round draft pick from the Saints. Defeating New Orleans would make that pick more valuable. Between playoff considerations and the added boon of that draft asset, they’re going to have all the motivation they’ll need to beat the Saints next Sunday.
So look for the Eagles to play all of their available starters in Week 17’s matchup at Lincoln Financial Field, likely including star quarterback Jalen Hurts (who was out of the lineup on Saturday with a sprained throwing shoulder). Hurts and the Eagles have run roughshod over the Saints in each of the last two years, outscoring New Orleans by margins of 24-21 (in 2020) and 40-29 (in 2021), with Hurts leading an offense that’s amassed 793 yards of offense between those two beatdowns. Philly has eclipsed 240 rushing yards in each of those previous meetings.
That’s a problem. What’s worse is that the Eagles are as difficult to defend through the air as on the ground, having invested a ton of resources in their receiving corps in recent years. Even if he fell short, Minshew still posted 34 points on the Cowboys — a total that would defeat most teams around the league, and which the Saints have outscored just once all season. It’s going to take an incredible defensive performance from New Orleans to keep this one close, but the Saints offense must pull its fair share to come away with a win, too. Let’s see how it shakes out.
