Eagles 56 Lions 21

In a second ½ that was not as exciting as the first, the Philadelphia Eagles bested the Detroit Lions 56-21. The 56 points was the most points scored by the Eagles under Coach Reid, and tied a club record from way back in 1953. In a game that produced over 500 yards of total offense, including 381 passing yards, nearly 150 yards rushing, the touchdowns were split evenly, 4 receiving and 4 rushing touchdowns. Kevin Curtis set a career high with 11 receptions for 221 yards and three touchdowns, to lead all Eagles receivers. Brian Westbrook finished the game with 110 yards on 14 touches and two touchdowns, and 5 receptions for 111 yards and one touchdown.

Donovan McNabb played as flawless a game as I have seen him play in a long time, in fact he had a perfect QB rating of 158.3. Despite all the outside distractions, with his HBO interview that was shown last week, and his poor performance in the last two games, McNabb came out like he had something to prove, and prove he did.

The offensive line was amazing, allowing only 3 sacks (1 against McNabb and two again rookie QB Kevin Kolb who came in a mop up role late in the third quarter), and opened up a lot of holes for the running backs and gave McNabb lots of time to pass the ball and find open receivers. Best of all his passes were on target, and he didn't kill any worms today.

This Sunday the Eagles wore throwback jersey's that were the teams first Jersey's from thier inaugural season in 1933 (see picture above). Even the Linc was repainted in the nostalgic yellow and blue. While certainly not my first choice, they are certainly different, and the team performed almost perfectly today. I wonder if the throwbacks will make another appearance this year, hell if they play like this in them, I'd keep wearing them

The defense, even though they held the Lions to 21 points, allowed Detroit QB Jon Kitna to throw for a career high 446 yards, although they did only allow 39 yards rushing. They did however sack Kitna 9 times, and held the Lions to zero points in the second half. The secondary was missing Dawkins and Sheppard, and their absence was most noted in the amount of passing yards given up.

Overall it was a well executed and highly emotional game, with a lot of excitement and some much needed confidence to the team and fans. Let's hope this momentum continues in to next week as the Eagles travel up the New Jersey turnpike to play the New York Giants.

--gfo

picture courtesy of CBS sportsline