PHILADELPHIA — The sight of a Super Bowl was secured by the greatest running back the Philadelphia Eagles have ever known.
Saquon Barkley broke away in brilliance before anyone could even blink, a scintillating sequence on the offense’s first play of the NFC Championship Game. Barkley took a reverse pitch, spun out of two tackles, reversed course, then scampered for a 60-yard touchdown.
For the third time this postseason, in the only stadium that considers him the NFL’s unanimous MVP, Barkley delivered a score of 60-plus yards. The man is history incarnate. He eschewed a shot at Eric Dickerson’s single-season rushing record for a shot at a Super Bowl, sitting out the regular-season finale then supplying 100-plus yards in three straight playoff games. The third one started with that opening run, setting off a 55-23 demolition of the Washington Commanders.
SAQUON 60 YARDS IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE
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“I came to Philly to be a part of games like this,” Barkley said.
Two years ago, Barkley stared at the Lincoln Financial Field scoreboard as his New York Giants were being sent home. He’d been shut down in that divisional-round loss. He spent one more year chasing the long-term contract the Giants never granted, then signed with the Eagles as the missing piece of a run-oriented system that’s now one game away from upending a pass-oriented league.
“One door closes, another one opened,” Barkley’s mother, Tonya Johnson, said in the tunnel. “And the one that opened may be much better.”
The Eagles spent the 2024 season kicking down opponents’ doors, with Barkley as their steel-toed boot. They confronted convention; no team in the last 10 seasons won a Super Bowl with a majority-run offense. But those teams didn’t have Barkley. They didn’t have an offensive line studded with Pro Bowlers. They didn’t have a dual-threat quarterback like Jalen Hurts, whose zone-read runs and pre-snap checks supported Barkley as he decimated defenses with a team-record 2,005 rushing yards during the regular season, and another 442 in the playoffs.
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The Eagles fielded the NFL’s seventh-highest scoring offense by averaging the franchise’s most rushing attempts per game (36.5) since 1978. “Yeah, it looks like high school wishbone,” right tackle Lane Johnson joked. But predictable? Hardly. Barkley bashed the Commanders in both of their regular-season meetings, totaling 296 rushing yards and four touchdowns. Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said they figured Washington would “sell out against the run” in their playoff rematch. Sure enough, when Hurts went under-center on their first snap of the game, the Commanders crowded the box with eight defenders.
Hurts backed off the line. He appeared to call an audible — Barkley later said it was fake.
“When you play a team two or three times, they kind of get a bead on some of your stuff,” grinned Barkley, who finished with 15 carries for 118 yards. “We gave them a dummy call and it worked to perfection.”
At the snap, wide receiver DeVonta Smith was in a jet motion from left to right. Hurts pitched left. Blockers forced a hole open, and Barkley was gone.
“It’s truly special to witness greatness,” left tackle Jordan Mailata said.
The score came so quickly that the defense didn’t have a chance to catch its breath. They had just held the Commanders to a field goal on an 18-play, 54-yard opening drive — it was the most plays an opponent ran on a single drive against the Eagles all season. Linebacker Zack Baun said he was taking in portable oxygen on the sideline when Barkley barreled by.
Were you breathing normally by the time you had to go back in?
“So what if I wasn’t?” Baun said. “It’s time to go.”
That’s the personality the Eagles want to embody. General manager Howie Roseman and Sirianni spent the offseason overhauling the coaching staff and repairing the roster to restore a swagger and grit that reflected the city. The organization navigated through the 2023 collapse and maintained stability despite the retirements of franchise pillars Jason Kelce and Fletcher Cox. Their successors, Cam Jurgens and Jalen Carter, both first-time Pro Bowlers in their new roles, have been pivotal during this postseason run.
Jurgens injured his back in last week’s divisional-round win over the Los Angeles Rams; he missed two practices during the week and was questionable entering Sunday. He spent several minutes stretching during warmups only to leave the field early. The Eagles started left guard Landon Dickerson at center instead — Dickerson hadn’t started a game at the pivot since he won the 2020 Rimington Trophy at Alabama in his final college season.
Still, the Eagles kept Jurgens active, preserving his availability for the kind of emergency situation that unfolded. Dickerson suffered a knee injury in the second quarter; he played the rest of the first half but couldn’t return after halftime. Jurgens played the remainder of the game. The Eagles ran the ball 18 more times in the second half, including a goal-line sequence in which they lined up for a Brotherly Shove four straight times because the Commanders committed three encroachment penalties (with linebacker Frankie Luvu prematurely launching himself over the offensive line twice). It was a somewhat amusing sequence that provoked referee Shawn Hochuli to announce Washington had been warned that “at some point” the Eagles would be awarded a score, per the rulebook, if the Commanders continued to get penalized.
Jurgens limped to his locker after the game, his reddish mullet matted with sweat. He buckled over in his chair, elbows against his knees.
“It took f—ing everything,” said Jurgens, who added he’d be ready for the Super Bowl. “It was a strange week. It was a long week, but it was a great f—ing day.”
This team has to embrace a little masochism when they play the way they do. The Eagles leverage their run-heavy offense against a rugged defense that’s as old-school as their defensive coordinator. Vic Fangio, 66, is overseeing perhaps his greatest defense yet. The regular season’s top-ranked unit has allowed an average of 18.3 points per game during the playoffs. The Eagles have forced 10 turnovers this postseason, including four against the Commanders. Baun, linebacker Oren Burks and Will Shipley (on kick coverage) each forced a fumble. Quinyon Mitchell picked off Jayden Daniels in the end zone on what was the final pass of Daniels’ season.
Philadelphia’s offense scored touchdowns after each Washington turnover. The Eagles’ 55 points were their second-most in their postseason history (just shy of their 58-37 trouncing of the Detroit Lions in the 1995 wild-card round). After Barkley’s 60-yard score, he extended the lead to 14-3 after Baun punched the football free from wide receiver Dyami Brown.
Commanders coach Dan Quinn authorized a fake punt on Washington’s ensuing possession. They converted, and eventually kicked a field goal. When the Eagles got the ball back, the Commanders blitzed Hurts into taking a third-and-6 sack, after which Jake Elliott missed a 54-yard field goal attempt wide right. Elliott’s slump — he’s now 1-of-8 on attempts of 50-plus yards this season — provided a vulnerability. Commanders receiver Terry McLaurin beat cornerback Darius Slay on a slant that turned into a 36-yard touchdown, pulling Washington within 14-12 with 7:15 left in the first half.
“You’ve got to keep your foot on the gas, especially in the playoffs,” Baun said. “I mean, we were up, I don’t know, 14 points last game against (the Rams) and they came back and almost won it. So, we knew we couldn’t let them stick around.”
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The Commanders took an aggressive tack. They blitzed Hurts often, hoping to force mistakes. Instead, Hurts put together his most impressive passing performance of the postseason. After failing to throw for 200 yards against the Rams and the Packers — games that included poor decisions, bad protection and untimely drops — Hurts widened Philadelphia’s lead by delivering critical throws with precision.
Just before the two-minute warning, on fourth-and-5 at Washington’s 45, Hurts struck A.J. Brown in stride for a 31-yard completion along the left sideline. Four plays later, he escaped Washington’s rush and found DeVonta Smith in the end zone — Smith couldn’t secure the touchdown, but did draw a pass interference penalty on Commanders cornerback Marshon Lattimore. Hurts scored on a 1-yard Brotherly Shove on the next play. The Commanders never drew within a single score again.
“How about QB1?” Mailata said of Hurts, who finished 20-of-28 passing for 246 yards, a touchdown and three rushing scores. “I love when people doubt him.”
The Eagles have long embraced the underdog mentality. When the franchise won its first Super Bowl title seven years ago, players wore dog masks throughout their unlikely postseason run. That dogma is long dead. The Eagles established themselves as perennial Super Bowl contenders in 2022. An 11-win season and playoff berth in 2023 ended with a cataclysmic collapse, the season considered a massive failure. They entered 2024 with the third-best Super Bowl odds and were favored in all but three of their regular-season games.
When Terry Bradshaw, representing FOX Sports at the postgame podium, titled the microphone toward Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie after suggesting Philadelphia’s postseason run was “unexpected,” Lurie balked at the characterization: “Well, it’s kind of expected, I think.”
The Eagles expect to win their second Super Bowl in franchise history. To do this, they must unseat the Kansas City Chiefs, who beat the Eagles two years ago and open Super Bowl LIX as 1.5-point favorites. The Eagles, underdogs again, expect to break through because of the running back who, in view of what’s ahead, cares little for the records amassed so far.
“It don’t matter if you don’t win it,” Barkley said. “That’s just the reality of it. All the things we’ve done — and we’ve done a lot… the most special thing you can do is win the Super Bowl. I wasn’t here two years ago, but I bought into this culture, I bought into this organization. I know how those guys felt. I’ll make sure I do everything in my capability so the same thing won’t happen again.”
(Photo: Bill Streicher / Imagn Images)
