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    • Saquon Barkley, Eagles give Commander Jayden Daniels a ‘gritty’ lesson
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    Saquon Barkley, Eagles give Commander Jayden Daniels a ‘gritty’ lesson

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    PHILADELPHIA − There are times when a team has to win a “dirty, gritty game,” as Eagles coach Nick Sirianni called this short week the appearance of a first-place showdown.

    Sirianni used other adjectives to describe the Eagles’ 26-18 win over the Washington Commanders on Thursday night, such as “muddy” and “ugly.”

    It was all that and then some.

    Two teams with offenses in the top five could only muster a total of 10 points in the first half. Jalen Hurts went to the medical tent near the end of the first half to be evaluated for a concussion after he ducked while trying to throw a pass when it landed on his helmet.

    “Not good,” right tackle Lane Johnson said when asked about Hurts’ helmet plant. “When you see grass coming out of his helmet, yeah man, he got rocked a few times. I thought he did a good job in the second half and really put it behind him.”

    Hurts was cleared to play in the second half.

    “I think I broke protocol,” he said wryly.

    That wasn’t the only setback. There was Jake Elliott seemingly forgetting how to kick with two missed field goals in the first half and a missed extra point on the Eagles’ touchdown with 12:00 remaining, giving the Eagles a precarious 12-10 lead.

    “The fact that we were able to pull this out after everything I put them through was pretty special,” Elliott said.

    To that point, Saquon Barkley had 69 yards on 20 carries, an average of just 3.5 yards per rush.

    And yet the Eagles continued to take everything away from the plucky Commanders and their starting quarterback Jayden Daniels, winning a physical, grinding, knockdown game.

    In doing so, the Eagles let the rest of the NFL know that they were moving beyond their 8-2 record and six-game winning streak.

    That statement simply means that the Eagles are not only more talented than almost any team, but also stronger. They can win the finesse game by throwing deep to AJ Brown and DeVonta Smith. They can win the power play behind Barkley and the offensive line.

    And the defense can take away the opponent’s will, as it did with Daniels, who threw for 191 yards, ran for just 18 yards and was stopped by Zack Baun on a fourth down midway through the fourth quarter.

    That’s because Barkley will eventually wear down a defense, as he did in the fourth quarter, when he gained 77 yards on his final six carries. That included touchdown runs of 23 and 39 yards within 20 seconds of playing time in the final five minutes to close out the game.

    “We just got it going,” Hurts said. “We were able to take some positive actions. And if you can get completions, keep the sticks moving, keep making progress and ultimately impose your physicality, that’s what it comes down to.”

    There was nothing special from Barkley. He didn’t back up a defender or double past another defender, as we saw in the previous two games.

    Rather, Barkley dropped his shoulder, tracked his blocks and then charged through them.

    VICTORY OF COMMANDERS: Eagles take command against Commanders despite Jalen Hurt injury scare, Jake Elliott missed FGs

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    Here, Johnson invoked the Eagles’ collapse from last season, when they started 10-1 and then finished 1-6.

    “I knew we had a talented squad, but the paper stuff doesn’t matter,” he said. “It’s about how you come together as a team, fight adversity and fight through things. We got punched in the mouth in the first half and no matter how well it goes, I want people to remember last year.

    “When you get to 10-1, you get a sense of complacency, and you quickly find out that this league will knock you on the ass if you let it.”

    Instead, it was the Eagles who punched Daniels and the Commanders in the derrières.

    That didn’t start with Barkley, but with his sidekick Kenny Gainwell. There he was, gaining 14, 13 and 7 yards on consecutive plays in the fourth quarter, moving the Eagles from the Commanders ’38 to the 4. Two plays later, Hurts’ push-push gave the Eagles a 12-10 lead.

    Then we saw it in defense of the Commanders’ subsequent possession. Daniels, the rookie phenom who had sparked the turnaround after years of ineptitude with his running and passing, found that out the hard way.

    Daniels responded to the Eagles’ TD by taking Washington to a 2nd and 1 at the Eagles’ 25. On that play, running back Brian Robinson was met at the line of scrimmage by Jalen Carter and Nakobe Dean for no gain. On third down, Robinson was thrown for a loss of 1 yard by Baun and Brandon Graham.

    That made it 4th and 2. Instead of attempting a go-ahead 44-yard field goal, Commanders coach Dan Quinn kept the offense on the field. Daniels appeared to swing the shotgun snap and then ran to his right. Safety Reed Blankenship slowed him down and Baun took him out of bounds, a yard short of the first-down marker.

    The Eagles took over with 7:55 to go. Shortly thereafter, Barkley broke the commanders’ will with his back-to-back touchdowns sandwiched around Daniels’ interception.

    That was enough for the Eagles. The first half consisted of all the adjectives Sirianni said. But the Eagles continued to distance themselves.

    “The mentality is always that you’re one game away,” Hurts said. “And if you keep going, keep going, everything will take care of itself. If we embrace that as a football team, how different can these things look, and how do we succeed, and how do we score points and I think we can continue to diversify ourselves in our efficiency.”

    It’s hard to stop a team when it can win in so many different ways, and especially in a grimy, sandy, muddy, ugly way.

    But Barkley wasn’t having any of that yet. The Eagles are 8-2 and command the Commanders and the rest of the NFC East.

    “You don’t get midseason trophies,” he said. “We have to keep going.”

    Contact Martin Frank at [email protected]. Follow on X @Mfranknfl.

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