{"id":461246,"date":"2025-12-21T01:56:18","date_gmt":"2025-12-21T01:56:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/461246\/"},"modified":"2025-12-21T01:56:18","modified_gmt":"2025-12-21T01:56:18","slug":"eagles-beat-commanders-to-clinch-nfc-east-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/461246\/","title":{"rendered":"Eagles beat Commanders to clinch NFC East again"},"content":{"rendered":"

LANDOVER, Md. — This was not a terrific performance by the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles<\/a>, from a fumble on the opening kickoff, to a pair of penalties on the tush push, to three wide-left field goal tries, to a halftime deficit.<\/p>\n

Still, Jalen Hurts<\/a>, Saquon Barkley<\/a>& Co. eventually got going in the right direction and clinched a second consecutive NFC East title by beating the Washington Commanders<\/a> 29-18<\/a> on Saturday night. The game included a late brawl after Barkley tacked on a 2-point conversion to increase the Eagles’ lead to 19 points.<\/p>\n

Starting plays under center far more frequently than he did earlier in the season, Hurts completed 22 of 30 throws — with 15 of those caught by A.J. Brown<\/a> or DeVonta Smith<\/a>— for 185 yards, two touchdowns and no turnovers. Hurts connected with Smith from 5 yards out in the first half and with tight end Dallas Goedert<\/a> from 15 to put Philadelphia ahead 14-10 in the third quarter, capping a 17-play, 83-yard, 10-minute drive.<\/p>\n

Hurts also did plenty of damage on the ground, gaining 40 yards on seven carries for the Eagles (10-5), who have followed a three-game losing streak by winning two in a row. They are the first team to top the NFC East in back-to-back seasons since Philadelphia did it every year from 2001 to 2004; the gap since then was the longest drought without a repeat champ for any division in NFL history.<\/p>\n

Barkley added a 12-yard TD run for the Eagles, part of his 21-carry, 132-yard performance.<\/p>\n

With the Commanders (4-11), now losers of nine of their past 10 contests, already eliminated from postseason contention, there was plenty of green in the stands. Chants of “E-A-G-L-E-S, Eagles!” frequently rang out and cries of “Cooooop!” greeted Cooper DeJean<\/a>‘s interception of Josh Johnson<\/a>, Washington’s third-string quarterback, who came in when Marcus Mariota<\/a> went out after the opening drive in the third quarter with an injured right hand while Washington led 10-7.<\/p>\n

Mariota started Saturday in place of Jayden Daniels<\/a>, the reigning AP NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year who led the Commanders to the NFC title game last season — where they lost 55-23 to Philadelphia — but has been shut down in 2025 after dealing with a series of injuries and appearing in only seven games.<\/p>\n

The chilly evening started inauspiciously for the Eagles: Will Shipley<\/a> coughed up the opening kickoff when he was hit by Mike Sainristil<\/a>, and Washington recovered at Philadelphia’s 27, eventually getting a field goal.<\/p>\n

The Eagles went up 7-3 on a drive that was nearly all Hurts. He was 4-for-5 passing for 53 yards, including a 6-yard TD toss to Smith, and added a 14-yard run.<\/p>\n

That’s not to say Hurts was perfect. He missed open receivers, including one on a particularly egregious overthrow of Brown and another on a miscommunication with Smith.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2025 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LANDOVER, Md. — This was not a terrific performance by the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, from a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":461247,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[210465,5229,5723,50,1232,1448,2830,1311,1105,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-461246","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-210465","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-espn","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-pa","14":"tag-pennsylvania","15":"tag-philadelphia","16":"tag-philadelphia-eagles","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115755075822179561","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461246","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461246"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461246\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461246"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461246"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461246"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}