Eagles Offense Beat the Giants in Every Way
The teams that win in January are versatile. They are able to succeed in multiple ways. Opponents can’t gameplan to take away just one element of their team and completely derail them. In the Divisional Round, the Giants found that out the hard way, as the Eagles won in every way possible.
Their offense, in particular, had answers for everything. They ran over and through the Giants. They beat man coverage and zone. They kept Hurts upright in the passing game with play-action, RPOs, and quick throws. They kept the Giants on their heels with various formations, alignments, and personnel groupings.
In short, offensive coordinator Shane Steichen called a great game, and the players executed in all areas.
Entering the playoffs, even the biggest Eagles fans had to be concerned with the way their team finished the regular season. They were banged up, lost 2 of their final 3 games, and no one knew just how effective Jalen Hurts would be while playing through an injured throwing shoulder. It didn’t take long for those concerns to be put to rest on Saturday night.
On their second play from scrimmage, the Eagles threw their first big punch of the game and attacked downfield with a post-dig route combination off of play-action:
Aligning with receivers DeVonta Smith and A.J. Brown in tight splits got them running their routes against safeties. On top of that, Smith was given a free release, making life that much more difficult for safety Julian Love, who was trying to protect against the post. You can see below how he tried staying inside of Smith right until the top of his route stem:
As soon as Love turned his hips to the outside, Smith broke for the post. With the safety to the other side of the field biting on Brown’s dig over the middle, all Hurts had to do was throw this ball across the field and let Smith keep running away from Love:
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From the end zone angle, you can see that the Eagles used play-action and pulled a guard (trap pass), which sold the run and held the pass rush. Watch the hesitation by defensive end Jihad Ward rushing from the left side:
The play-action gave the routes the time they needed to develop, and it gave Hurts the space to get his entire body into the throw (an important thing if your throwing shoulder isn’t 100%).
Later in the drive, Philly faced a 3rd-and-5 from the Giants’ 16-yard line. The Eagles started in a 2x2 set and motioned running back Kenneth Gainwell from the backfield to the perimeter. Safety Tony Jefferson followed him, an indicator of man coverage:
Knowing it was man, Hurts could pick the route combination or matchup he liked best. He chose tight end Dallas Goedert running a stutter-out underneath Zach Pascal’s quick-in on a designed pick play: