It wasn’t the prettiest game, but the Eagles were able to beat the New Orleans Saints on the road for the first time since 2007 in a 15-12 win Sunday. It was however, a gusty win. The Eagles’ defense held what was the best scoring offense through the first two weeks in check and the offense made enough plays down the stretch to earn the win. All while overcoming some injuries to major offensive pieces in wide receiver DeVonta Smith, left tackle Lane Johnson, and right guard Mekhi Becton.
Eagles HC Nick Sirianni joins WIP to discuss Saints win
Head coach Nick Sirianni spoke with the WIP Morning crew on Tuesday, and he couldn’t stop mentioning how much of a team win the victory was.
“Getting the guys in there in terms of the backups to play and stepping up, it was just a good team win,” Sirianni said.
“How we handled adversity from week before. We cleaned a lot of things up in the week of practice and it’s huge that you can do that while dealing with adversity. We talked about roles on the team and to be ready for when their time comes, they put the work in to be ready.”
Sirianni said that despite the offense stalling in the red zone and not converting on two of their three fourth-down plays, the defense was positive and knew it was on them to keep the team in the game until the offense broke through.
“The defense saying to the offense on the sideline was awesome. To see and hear how many times they said, I got you, it was just such good team football that this 2024 Eagles team got tighter, a lot tighter from that experience there.”
Jalen Hurts had two more turnovers in the win, but overall, put together a solid performance and Sirianni liked what he saw from his quarterback.
“I thought he saw it well with delivering the ball where it needed to go, throwing hot routes off of blitzes. It’s the way it goes. He’s going to get blamed for the interception because it goes on his stat sheet, but there were a lot of factors that went into that. He has to put two hands on the football when he scrambles, and he’ll be the first one to tell you that’s on him. When you have those two blips on his stat line, it’s going to get looked at, but I feel he operated the offense very well. We stalled out a few times in red zone, but I thought in the two-minute drill he was great.”
As Saquon Barkley continues to shine as an Eagle, Sirianni was asked about the usage of the newly added running back and if there’s concern about how he holds up over the course of the season. Sirianni was adamant that it’s not a concern because they are focused on winning every game at whatever price.
“You do everything you can do to win each and every individual game,” Sirianni said.
“Imagine if we didn’t give him the ball as much as we did and lost? If we tried to pull back and not give him the ball that much and lose, that’s not going to work. If he needs to carry it seven times to win because we have to throw it a bunch to win, we will. If he needs to carry it 50 times to win, he’s getting the ball 50 times. The way we can make that up is in practice, ask how he’s doing, play it off with the bye, saying hey you’ve got a couple days off give me everything you’ve got.”
Sirianni didn’t disclose any injury updates, but he was asked about this controversial play that resulted in Smith’s concussion.
“I am just feeling for DeVonta that he got hurt on that play. I know this, everybody knows that this is their livelihood. I don’t think for one minute that player or ref was trying to do that on purpose. Everyone is out there laying their lives out there on the line for the game they love. I’ll never question someone’s integrity on that. Just glad Smitty is feeling good. It was extremely hard to watch…He’s the toughest guy I know. Forget the pound-for-pound saying. I love that guy, the team loves him.”
Time will tell if the Eagles will be without Smith and Johnson as they get ready for their second straight road game as they travel to Tampa Bay this week to take on the Buccaneers (2-1) looking to bounce back after a surprising 26-7 loss to Denver. Kickoff is at 1:00 p.m.
Mandatory Credit: Bill Streicher-Imagn Images
