Northwest Stadium (Landover, Md.) — The Eagles are the defending Super Bowl champs, so most of the team has already hung the biggest banners a team can celebrate.
Stevie Wonder’s “Sir Duke” blared in a celebratory visiting locker room — “You can feel it all over,” they sang, with the team owner, general manager and coach taking photos with jubilant players. “BEEN THERE, WON THAT,” read the black T-shirts commemorating the back-to-back NFC East titles clinched with a 29-18 win over the Commanders.
“It’s good to get the first hat and T-shirt,” cornerback Cooper DeJean told me.
So, as the defending Super Bowl champions, why celebrate what is only the first of several team goals for the 2025 season?
For starters, the NFC East hadn’t seen any repeat champ since 2004, when the Eagles had won four straight at the peak of the Andy Reid and Donovan McNabb years. The NFL has also shown that dynasties can be fleeting, with the Chiefs missing the playoffs and the Bills currently trailing the Patriots after five straight AFC East titles.
“These times, they’re rare times,” said quarterback Jalen Hurts, who threw for two touchdowns in the win. “So [it’s] something that we all need to soak in and relish in this moment right now, but keep the main thing [as] the main thing.”
The message on Saturday was that small things can be celebrated. A few hours earlier, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in the capital nearby, a mock funeral service was held for the penny, with a solemn bunch of pallbearers dressed like Abe himself carrying an actual coffin past an easel reading “Rest in Pence.”
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That’s not the Eagles’ attitude, though. While they will happily take their newly minted NFC East crown and put it away, they know they haven’t reached the same heights as last season. The last two weeks, though, brought a 31-0 win over the Raiders and this relatively convincing win over the Commanders.
The hope is that the best is yet to come.
“We’re getting close,” DeJean said. “I still feel like there’s things we can clean up, as always, but we’ve just got to keep building, building on what we did this week and last week, to continue to try to play our best football going down the stretch.”
The Eagles continue to be an imperfect team. While 10-5 is good enough to clinch the division, it’s their worst record at this point over the last four years, a span that has included two Super Bowl appearances. Philadelphia pulled away Saturday, but it started slowly enough that it trailed a 4-10 Commanders team late in the third quarter.
Cooper DeJean’s third quarter interception helped swing the game in the Eagles’ favor. (Photo by Randy Litzinger/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
The Eagles are only two weeks removed from a three-game losing streak, and the offense has scored fewer than 20 points six times after going more than a year without such a game.
The defense gave up 34 points in a loss to the Giants earlier this season, but has now seemed to find itself again. Kicker Jake Elliott has missed five field goals in the last five games, including two Saturday.
The current trajectory, though, is upward after a 31-0 shutout of the Raiders last week before beating the Commanders.
“We just keep working,” defensive tackle Jordan Davis said. “The only limitations are what we put on ourselves. The sky’s the limit. We’re the masters of our own destiny. We just have to go out there and keep claiming it. We have to be consistent. So, that’s my thing, being an impact [player] and claiming consistency.”
Against the Commanders, there were signs of last year’s dominant Eagles, especially in the run game by piling up 207 yards, their second-best total of the season. Saquon Barkley, held in check much of this season, broke loose in the second half, with a gritty 12-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter and a 48-yard run to set up another score.
It’s not just Barkley who ignites the run game, though. Offensive tackle Jordan Mailata was quick to point out that it’s a team effort.
“Did you see Smitty’s block?” Mailata told me, referencing receiver DeVonta Smith on the 48-yard run. “Go back and watch Smitty’s block. Oh, my goodness. I love watching Saquon run, but I love watching Smitty blocking. Because man, it’s amazing how for an undersized receiver. … That man can block his ass off and he does a damn good job at it.”
Not everything on Saturday looked like the 2024 Eagles, though. Their signature tush push, so effective in short yardage that NFL owners nearly voted to ban it, was stopped three times at the 1-yard line by the Commanders, twice on false starts on offensive linemen. Hurts made up for it both times, throwing a 6-yard touchdown pass to Smith, and most importantly, a 16-yard touchdown to tight end Dallas Goedert for the lead on a third-and-goal play late in the third.
“You lean on that play, you expect us to convert on the 1-yard line, and we just didn’t do it that time,” Mailata said. “Pretty happy that Dallas and Jalen could bail us out on that one, but that’s just how it goes.”
If the tush push is going the way of the penny, how do the Eagles avoid the same fate? Is last night a sign of things to come?
The Eagles want more than to just repeat as NFC East champions, and head coach Nick Sirianni said that, like anything else, his team must counter the way opponents eventually find ways to beat the unbeatable.
“You know, teams adjust. We’ve got to continue to adjust,” Sirianni said. “What I was really encouraged by – obviously, you don’t want penalties … but we were really able to overcome them. That’s what this game is about. There’s ups and downs throughout this game, and there were ups and downs through this game, and we were able to overcome, and hats off to our guys.”
Greg Auman is an NFL Reporter for FOX Sports. He previously spent a decade covering the Buccaneers for the Tampa Bay Times and The Athletic. You can follow him on Twitter at @gregauman.
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