EAGLES NEWS

On life support just a few weeks ago the Birds are now alive and well after totally dominating the Giants this afternoon for their 2nd win in a row. From the beginning the Giants offense appeared distracted and was totally out of sink. As a result the Eagles defense had its best game of the season thus far holding the Giants to just 211 yards of offense, just 88 rushing, and 123 passing. NY was also just 3 for 11 on 3rd down, o for 3 on 4th down, and wound up with just one offensive score all game long , a touchdown late in the game. The Eagles offense on the other hand took a page out of the Giants book with a methodically efficient performance with lots of runs and short passes, that ate up over 30 minutes of clock including most of the 2nd half, while racking up a solid 331 yards on the day. Brian Westbrook was the star with 33 carries for 131 rushing yds and 1 TD, and 6 catches for 72 yards and another TD. Donovan Mcnabb did not have his best day, but he managed the game well, did not make any mistakes, and completed 19 0f 30 passes for a solid 191 yards and a TD. Late in the first quarter David Akers gave the Eagles the early 3-0 lead with a 51 yard field goal. Late in the 2nd quarter Westbrook finished off a long Eagles drive dashing 30 yards for his 1st score and a 10-0 lead. After the Giants failed to do anything on their final drive of the half, the Eagles appeared poised to go up 13-0 at the half with another Aker's field goal, but it was blocked and then scooped up by Kevin Dockery who ran it back 71 yards for a score cutting the Eagles halftime lead to 10-7. The Eagles, unfazed, put together another long drive to start the 3rd quarter, before Akers was blocked again, this time with no return. Fortunately, New York again went nowhere on offense, and the Eagles preceded to run out the rest of the 3rd quarter on another long drive, capped off early in the 4th, by a 40 yd TD pass from Mcnabb to Westbrook for a 17-7 lead. After another empty Giants drive, the Birds preceded to eat up all but the final 2 minutes of the game on their next drive, before Akers finally booted another field goal through the uprights untouched. The Giants finally put together a nice drive on their next possession as Eli Manning hooked up with Darcy Johnson for a 1 yd TD pass to cut the lead to 20-14, but with only 15 seconds to play it was too little too late ,as the Eagles recovered the ensuing onsides kick an ran out the clock for the huge win 20-14 win. So the Birds move to 7-5-1 overall, and with the Redskins dropping to 7-6 , and the Cowboys and Falcons both dropping to 8-5 today, they are right back in the thick of the playoff race, at 3rd place in the NFC East, and just a half game out of the last playoff spot in the NFC.