EAGLES NEWS

It's been a wild up and down season for the Birds thus far. No one expected at the beginning of the season that it would culminate in a wild card playoff game at the Linc today. After all this was supposed to be a rebuilding year. Then Mike Vick was inserted as the starting QB and suddenly the Birds were super bowl contenders which makes what happened today against Green Bay all the tougher to swallow. The Eagles simply weren't as effective as they needed to be on both sides of the ball. Offensively, Vick was close to his usual self, throwing for 292 yards and a TD and running for 32 yards and another TD. Other than that there wasn't much like. Jason Avant did catch 7 passes for 93 yards and a TD, and Jeremy Maclin had 3 catches for 73 yards, but Desean Jackson had just 2 catches for 47 yards and Lesean McCoy managed just 46 yards on 12 carries. Meanwhile the Eagle's defense did hold Aaron Rodgers just 180 yards passing and Greg Jennings to just 1 catch for 8 yards, but rookie RB James Starks ran 23 times for 123 yards and that proved to be the difference.

Early on it was all Green Bay as David Akers missed a field goal Rodgers marched the Packers to 2 TDs for a 14-0 lead with 5 minutes left in the 2nd quarter. Finally with a minute left in the quarter Akers drilled a 29 yard field goal to make it 14-3 at the half. Early in the 3rd quarter the Birds took advantage of a Rodgers' fumble as Vick found Avant from 24 yards out to cut it to 14-10. After the Eagle's defense succumbed to another long Packer drive, resulting in another TD and a 21-10 deficit. After another miss by Akers, the Eagles finally put a drive together as Vick marched them 75 yards in 13 plays before plunging in himself from a yard out, cutting the lead to 21-16 after a missed 2 point conversion. The Eagles actually held on 3rd and short after that and had the ball in Vick's hands with about a minute to play and a chance to win. After starting at their own 34, Vick took the Birds down to the Green Bay 27, where they had 1st and 10 with 44 seconds left. Rather than downing the ball there and wasting play Vick decided to take a shot down field and was intercepted in the end zone by Tramond Williams. That was it, season over and super bowl dreams crushed again.