Those who love high-flying offenses likely were not a big fan of Sunday night's showdown between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Detroit Lions at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.
But the Eagles couldn't care less about what people say about the game, as at the end of the day, the reigning Super Bowl champions scored a 16-9 victory over the visiting side of Jared Goff and company.
The 16 points that the Eagles produced were more than enough to send Detroit home with a loss, thanks in large part to Philadelphia's stop unit that repeatedly made plays when the team needed it the most. In fact, the Lions went just 3-for-13 on third downs. Detroit was also bold enough to challenge the Eagles' defense with several fourth-down tries, but the Lions came up empty in all of those attempts.
“Almost disrespectful,” Eagles linebacker Nakobe Dean said after the game of the Lions’ fourth-down tries (h/t Zach Berman of The Athletic). “We came out on defense and played our type of game — we wanted to play on our terms, impose our will physically.”
Philadelphia's success on defense against the Lions on fourth downs also earned praise from head coach Nick Sirianni.
“Awesome. Those are turnovers in our mind, ”Sirianni said, per Dave Zangaro of NBC Sports Philadelphia.
The Lions outgained Philadelphia on offense, 317 yards to 272 yards, but the Eagles simply made the stops when it mattered. Goff was held to 255 passing yards on 14-of-37 pass completions, while the Lions' vaunted ground attack was limited to only 74 rushing yards.
The win over the Lions extended Philadelphia's win streak to four games and improved the Eagles' overall record to 8-2.
