EAGLES NEWS

With nothing to play for this afternoon the Eagles did the smart thing and rested their starters as they completed their regular season by hosting the Dallas Cowboys. Despite featuring their backups against the Cowboy's starters, it was the Eagles who actually seemed like the better team on the field for most of the evening. Unfortunately they just came up a little short at the end. Despite running for his life most of the game Kevin Kolb still managed to throw for 162 yards and a TD, but he was intercepted 3 times, which hurt. Meanwhile, Jerome Harrison rushed 21 times for 99 yards, and Chad Hall caught 6 of Kolb's 18 completions for 84 yards and a TD. Other than that the Eagle's offense consisted mostly of Kolb getting sacked or throwing the ball away in frustration. That happens a lot when you have backup tight ends and lineman trying to stop Demarcus Ware. The Eagles backup defense actually looked better in this one then their starting defense has looked recently. They allotted Dallas just 1 TD all day and held them to just 5 of 16 on 3rd down conversions. They were solid against the run and the pass and came within a minute and a half of carrying the Eagles to a win.

Early in the 2nd quarter Kolb connected with Hall from yards out for an early 7-0 lead. It looked for all intentions from there that the Birds would maintain their 7-0 lead at the half, as both teams struggled to move the ball on offense. Just when the Eagles looked poised to maybe extend their lead at the half Kolb was stripped by Ware who went 17 yards the other way to knot things up at 7. That remained the score into the 4th quarter as the two teams continued to struggle. Finally, early in the 4th the Birds got in field goal and David Akers drilled a 43 yard attempt to make it 10-7. Then about halfway though the period, following a long Kolb completion to Chad Hall, the Eagles settled on another field goal, this one just 22 yards out, to make it 13-7. It looked that might be enough as the Eagle's defense continued to swarm, but they ran out of gas at the end and with 55 seconds left in regulation, McGee found Jason Witten from 4 yards out to seal a 14-13 Cowboy win. If this game had mean something, it would have been a blowout win for the Birds, instead the loss drops them to 10-6 overall and they will now host the Green Bay Packers next week.