FULL BOX SCORE

1. Saquon weakened Commanders after a slow start. Jake Elliott missed his first two field goal attempts – both wide left – and later missed an extra point attempt that kept the score at 12-10 after the Eagles took the lead for the first time early in the fourth quarter. That’s seven points the Eagles left on the field. It felt like they had dominated the game after a Commanders’ TD drive, but the game was in doubt until late. Than Saquon Barkley delivered the second of three haymakers in the second half, a 23-yard touchdown, with just under five minutes remaining to ultimately give the Eagles a two-score lead. Twenty seconds later – after a Jayden Daniels pick – Barkley ripped off a 39-yard TD, giving him 146 yards and two scores. The NFL’s leader in rushing yards and scrimmage yards blew past the 1,000-yard mark for the season in the first half and destroyed the Commanders in the final few minutes. Barkley’s 43-yard catch-and-run was also set up Jalen hurts‘ TD is more likely to sneak into the fourth quarter. It was another slow start for the Eagles’ offense – with some blunders from the special teams – but they eventually got going, thanks in large part to Barkley. What a great addition he has been to this Eagles offense.
2. Daniels struggled, but his wide receivers were invisible. Jayden Daniels has been the overwhelming favorite for AP NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year since the early weeks of the 2024 season. He’s been great, no doubt. But might he hit the rookie wall? That’s two straight underperformances in two games: Sunday’s loss to the Steelers and Thursday night’s loss to the Eagles. Those are also two very good teams, so the level of competition must be taken into account. Daniels looked a bit slow on some throws, was nervous at times when his first read wasn’t open and again found few scrambling lanes. Most of Daniels’ throws were short; there were simply no windows available in the field for most of the night. His late interception was just a forced pass, and that cost a lot of money. But the blame can also be placed on his wide receivers, who combined for four receptions and 28 yards. Terry McLaurin didn’t see a goal until 11:11 into the third quarter, the second time in his career he had a scoreless first half. His first catch came ten minutes into the fourth. Austin Ekeler also had a third-down drop with a chance for a conversion. Daniels rallied the Commanders with a late score and two-point conversion, but the Eagles fell on the ensuing onside kick to end it.
3. Hurts settled down after a rough first quarter. Stop the presses: Jalen hurts and the Eagles got off to a slow start. But while they kept in touch with their recent offensive flourishes, they all found their way as the game progressed. Hurts struggled in the first quarter, completing four of ten passes for 42 yards and recording a drive-killing sack. Despite being evaluated for a concussion before halftime, Hurts began to take control of the game ahead of Saquon Barkley’s huge fourth quarter, hitting 14 of his last 18 passes for 174 yards over the last three quarters, along with the TD- run. His scrambling and designed runs seemed to wear down the Commanders’ rushers in the second half, when the Eagles had two scoring drives lasting more than five minutes. The Eagles’ offensive line also struggled to gain a foothold early Landon Dickerson leave the game briefly and Lane Johnson give up some pressure and a bag. But eventually Hurts and Barkley took over. It was a good last three quarters that kept getting better as the game went on.
4. The Commanders’ defense falters late in their first set of losses. For the second time in four days, Washington’s defense struggled after halftime. Sunday against Pittsburgh, the Commanders gave up a 10-point lead, starting strong defensively but allowing two long TD drives in a tough home loss. On Thursday night, the Commanders astonishingly took the lead in the fourth quarter, again playing well early before softening up significantly. The Eagles gained 426 yards and just outpaced Washington up front; they should have scored more than 30 points with all the missed kicks. There was poor gap integrity late against Barkley, which seemed to be the function of a struggling, tired defense. Admittedly, the offense didn’t do its job: five possessions lasted less than two minutes. They will have some time to work out the issues, with a ten day break until the Cowboys come to town, and perhaps newly acquired Marshon Lattimore will be ready by then. They missed him Thursday night. But commanders know they’ll have to put in a better effort defensively for 60 minutes, with or without Lattimore.
5. The Eagles cornerbacks led a major defensive effort. When the Commanders walked down the field for a quick TD drive in the first quarter, it was a brief flashback to some of the struggles the Eagles defense had experienced beforehand. That feeling was temporary. The Eagles bounced back most of the night with a suffocating defensive performance, led by their standout cornerbacks Darius Slay And Quinyon Mitchell. It says something about the Eagles’ confidence in rookie Mitchell that they would task him with beating a Pro Bowl receiver like McLaurin, but Mitchell rewarded them with a fine effort and helped hold McLaurin to one 10-yard catch. Slay was great against Noah Brownat. We should also point out some other major efforts such as Zack Baunwho defended a nice pass and had 14 tackles, including a great stop on Jayden Daniels on a fourth-down scramble. Jalen Carter And Brandon Graham also had big nights beforehand. But those Eagles corners were on fire Thursday.

Next-Gen Stat Insight for Commanders-Eagles (via NFL Pro): Jalen Hurts completed all of his final eight passes against the blitz for 109 yards after starting the game going 0 for 2 and recording two sacks. When facing four or fewer pass rushers, he completed just 10 of 18 passes for 112 yards. In the second half, Hurts was not pressured on any of his 11 dropbacks and completed 8 of 9 passes for 120 yards (+7.5% CPOE).

NFL Research: Saquon Barkley has six games with over 100 rushing yards this season, the most in the NFL. Barkley had six such games combined with the New York Giants between 2020 and 2023.