How Saquon Barkley and 'grimy, gritty' Eagles defense gave Jayden Daniels a painful lesson

PHILADELPHIA − There are times when a team has to win a "grimy, gritty game," as Eagles coach Nick Sirianni called this short-week semblance of a first-place showdown.

Sirianni used other adjectives to describe the Eagles' 26-18 win over the Washington Commanders on Thursday night, like "muddy," and "ugly."

It was all of that, and then some.

Two teams with top-five ranked offenses could only muster a total of 10 points in the first half. Jalen Hurts went to the medical tent near the end of the first half to be evaluated for a concussion after he dove trying to throw a pass as he landed on his helmet.

"Not good," right tackle Lane Johnson said when asked about Hurts' helmet-plant. "When you see grass coming out of his helmet, yeah man, he got rocked a few times. I thought he did a good job coming in the second half, and really putting it behind him."

Hurts was cleared to play in the second half.

"I guess I beat the protocol," he said wryly.

That wasn't the only setback. There was Jake Elliott seemingly forgetting how to kick with two missed field goals in the first half and a missed extra point on the Eagles' go-ahead touchdown with 12:00 left that gave the Eagles a precarious 12-10 lead.

"The fact that we were able to pull this out after everything I put them through was pretty special," Elliott said.

To that point, Saquon Barkley had 69 yards on 20 carries, averaging just 3.5 yards per rush.

And yet, the Eagles proceeded to take everything away from the plucky Commanders and their rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels, winning a physical, drag-out, knock-down game.

In the process, the Eagles served notice to the rest of the NFL that went beyond their 8-2 record, and six-game winning streak.

That notice is simply that the Eagles are not only more talented than pretty much every team, they're also tougher. They can win the finesse game by throwing deep to A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith. They can win the power game behind Barkley and the offensive line.

And the defense can take the opponents' will away, like it did to Daniels, who threw for 191 yards, ran for only 18, and was stopped by Zack Baun on a fourth-down midway through the fourth quarter.

That's because Barkley will eventually wear down a defense, like he did in the fourth quarter, when he gained 77 yards on his last 6 carries. That included touchdown runs of 23 and 39 yards within 20 seconds of game time in the final five minutes to put the game away.

"We just got it rolling," Hurts said. "We were able to get some positive plays. And when you’re able to get completions, keep the sticks moving, keep progressing, and then impose your physicality in the end of it, that’s what it comes down to."

There wasn't anything fancy from Barkley. He didn't backwards hurdle a defender, or double spin his way past another, like we saw in the previous two games.

Rather, Barkley lowered his shoulder, followed his blocks, then burst his way through.

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Here, Johnson invoked the Eagles' collapse of last season, when they started 10-1, then finished 1-6.

"I knew we had a talented roster, but the paper stuff doesn’t matter," he said. "It’s about how you come together as a team, battle adversity and fight through stuff. We got hit in the mouth in the first half, and as good as things are going, I want people to remember last year.

"You get to 10-1 and get that complacency feeling, and you find out quickly this league will knock you on your ass if you let it."

Instead, it was the Eagles knocking Daniels and the Commanders on their derrieres.

That started not with Barkley, but with his sidekick Kenny Gainwell. There he was, gaining 14, 13 and 7 yard on successive plays in the fourth quarter, taking the Eagles from the Commanders' 38 down to the 4. Two plays later, Hurts' tush push gave the Eagles that 12-10 lead.

Then we saw it on defense on the Commanders ensuing possession. Daniels, the rookie phenom who had sparked the turnaround from years of ineptitude with his running and passing, found that out the hard way.

Daniels responded to the Eagles' TD by taking Washington to a 2nd-and-1 at the Eagles' 25. On that play, running back Brian Robinson was met at the line of scrimmage by Jalen Carter and Nakobe Dean for no gain. On third down, Robinson was thrown for a 1-yard loss by Baun and Brandon Graham.

That made it 4th-and-2. Rather than try a go-ahead 44-yard field goal, Commanders coach Dan Quinn kept the offense on the field. Daniels seemed to bobble the shotgun snap, then ran to his right. Safety Reed Blankenship slowed him down and Baun leveled him out of bounds a yard short of the first-down marker.

The Eagles took over with 7:55 left. Soon after, Barkley broke the Commanders' will with his back-to-back touchdowns sandwiched around Daniels' interception.

That was enough for the Eagles. The first half was all of the adjectives Sirianni said. But the Eagles kept plugging away.

"The mentality is always that you’re one play away," Hurts said. "And if you keep pressing on, keep going, you know, everything kind of answers itself ... As we embrace that as a football team, how different these things can look, and how we succeed, and how we put up points and produce, I think we’ll be able to continue to diversify ourselves in our efficiency."

It's hard to stop a team when it can win in so many different ways, and especially in a grimy, gritty, muddy, ugly way.

But Barkley wasn't having any of that just yet. The Eagles are 8-2, in command of the Commanders and the rest of the NFC East.

"You don’t get trophies for midseason," he said. "We gotta keep going."

Contact Martin Frank at [email protected]. Follow on X @Mfranknfl.