PHILADELPHIA — Even after everything that spiraled, the Los Angeles Rams had their chance in the final minutes — to right the wrongs in this game, on a field where last season’s title hopes ended.

But when the ball snapped and was placed on the ground, everything went wrong. Jordan Davis burst through the field goal unit and swatted Joshua Karty’s kick. Then Davis scooped the ball and returned it for a touchdown as Philadelphia Eagles fans turned Lincoln Financial Field into a frenzy.

The Rams lost 33-26 in what felt like two games in one. This was a day of swirling momentum, with stars on both teams trading splash plays until someone had to lose. The Rams were again in a battle with the defending champions, but suffered their third loss to Philadelphia in the past year.

“I hate the Eagles,” Rams running back Kyren Williams said.

That’s because the Eagles are not just a juggernaut team that has won 19 of its last 20 games. It’s because they represent the boulder the Rams are trying to push up the mountain top, back to the Super Bowl stage they reached and became champions in Matthew Stafford’s first season with Sean McVay in 2021.

The Eagles are the one team that’s had McVay’s number. He’s 1-6 against them in his career and 89-52 against everyone else.

The Rams’ 2021 championship isn’t a distant memory yet, but it came before this latest Eagles run began, before Jalen Hurts emerged, and before A.J. Brown, Jalen Carter and Saquon Barkley arrived to become the nemesis who leave the Rams feeling the sting.

For so much of Sunday’s game, Los Angeles looked like a team that had grown from January’s divisional-round playoff loss. Its quarterback responded to an interception on the opening possession to lead six straight scoring drives. The rushing attack was gashing Philadelphia on the edge, with a sharp plan to run away from the brick walls of Carter and Davis. The special teams were suffocating the Eagles with Karty’s knuckleball kickoffs.

The pass rush was ferocious, creating a strip-sack for another week, this time when Jared Verse beat fill-in right tackle Matt Pryor so badly that he nearly took Hurts’ head off. And there was Verse, stomping toward the end zone and barking at Eagles fans. He and Byron Young looked to have an edge duo that was too much to handle, so much so that Hurts finished the first half with minus-1 net passing yards.

The run defense was everything it never was last season, when Barkley ripped off the two best games of his career with 460 total rushing yards and four runs of 60-plus. And that was the one part of this that sustained, as Barkley finished with just 46 yards on 18 carries and the Eagles had 86 total rushing yards.

But the Rams lost anyway, and that’s what really stings. They had a counter to what hurt them in January, but something else was missing.

“It’s a tough feeling, knowing that we got where we wanted to,” wide receiver Puka Nacua said of the final drive. “Something we know we have to be better at is scoring in the red zone and being able to finish drives with everybody celebrating in the end zone.”

The Eagles, once down 26-7 after Verse’s strip-sack set up an easy pitch and catch from Stafford to Williams early in the third quarter, came alive by attacking what the Rams still don’t have on their roster.

They don’t have cornerbacks who can match up with outside receivers such as Brown and DeVonta Smith. Not many teams do, but that’s the hill the Rams are trying to climb. In the first game after losing Ahkello Witherspoon to a broken clavicle, his roster replacement, Tre Brown, didn’t play on defense. Los Angeles instead trusted a 32-year-old veteran it previously benched in Darious Williams, as well as a 24-year-old reclamation project in Emmanuel Forbes Jr. on the outside.

Brown racked up 109 yards and a touchdown against Darious Williams. Smith caught eight of nine targets and the go-ahead touchdown against Forbes. Los Angeles paid for low investments at a premium position that its pass rush can’t forever cover up.

“We’ve got to stand up,” Forbes said, “and stop them.”

A.J. Brown had his best outing of the season against the Rams, catching six passes for 109 yards and adding a TD late in the third quarter to make it a one-score game. (Ishika Samant / Getty Images)

They don’t have the depth on the interior of the offensive line to withstand injuries. Again, not many teams do, but the Eagles often find a way. The Rams started Justin Dedich in place of Steve Avila at left guard and brought Beaux Limmer in for stretches at right guard when Kevin Dotson was dealing with cramps. They ran behind Limmer with Kyren Williams on a fourth-and-1 early in the fourth quarter that Davis blew up immediately. The center of the line, which Dotson helps man, couldn’t hold for the final two field goal attempts.

“The reality is that we’ve got to execute better, and credit to them, they made the plays,” McVay said of the blocks. “I’m not going to make any excuses.”

The question facing these Rams is the one McVay threw at them in the locker room after the game.

“You can take it two ways: You can either fold or you can accept what happened and move on from it and grow from it,” Kyren Williams said.

That is true for understanding this year’s Rams, too.

Is it right to believe in the strengths they showed? From a run game that put up 160 yards to Adams and Nacua combining for 168 yards to a quarterback who led what should have been his 50th career game-winning drive to a much-improved run defense to a pass rush that at times looked unblockable?

Or is it right to get caught up in what they don’t have, such as a complete special teams, No. 1 cornerback or deep interior offensive line that must protect a 37-year-old quarterback with a degenerative back issue?

This season will tell the tale, of course, continuing with the 3-0 Indianapolis Colts next week and a stretch of opposing running backs that features Jonathan Taylor, Christian McCaffrey and Derrick Henry in the next three games.

But answers must come in two specific areas: The Rams have to find a way to turn their chunk plays into touchdown drives. They have to find answers to when the field shrinks in the red zone, when Adams and Nacua can’t control spacing with deeper routes. They have to find the finishing touch in a run game that doesn’t have the quarterback rushing threat to flip the math in short-yardage situations like the Eagles. That’s going to have to come through the emergence of a tight end, better situational play calling from McVay and an offensive line getting Dotson and Avila on the field at the same time.

Los Angeles has to be able to play better at outside cornerback. That could come with a step from Forbes, who is still a superb athlete and has just 11 career starts — though at 166 pounds, he’s going to remain limited physically in matchups with players like the 226-pound Brown. He’ll face the 223-pound Michael Pittman Jr. next week. It could eventually come through a Witherspoon return in December. Or the Rams could orchestrate a trade, or sign Stephon Gilmore or Kendall Fuller.

The Rams must find a way to win when Stafford isn’t at his best. He was affected by the Eagles’ interior rush, as he isn’t mobile enough to scramble out of the pocket at this age. He said a number of his incompletions on a 19-of-33 day had a common denominator.

“Just physical for me,” Stafford said. “I was disappointed with how I threw it in some instances.”

Los Angeles is not a team whose quarterback is going to overwhelm physically, the way the Eagles do at times with Hurts and every AFC contender does. It needs superstar playmakers and a complete defense to do its part, as well as special teams that don’t make losing plays.

The good news is that, outside of Witherspoon, the Rams have most of those pieces, even if some of them, such as Stafford, McVay and Adams, weren’t at their best Sunday. If they can figure out the secondary, the ingredients exist to be a force on both sides of the ball.

But after another loss to the Eagles, the burden of proof is on all of them.

“It came down to crunch time, and we just have to finish and make the play to win the game. It’s as simple as that,” safety Kam Curl said. “We’re going to hold each other accountable. We’re going to let this cut bleed. And then we’re going to move on to the Colts.”

(Top photo of Matthew Stafford: Mitchell Leff / Getty Images)