McCoy and Eagles Running Game Explode In The Second Half

When you hear the statement that football is a team sport, you should think of yesterday’s game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Detroit Lions.  The weather was terrible, which brings to mind my idea of fining the weather forecasters when they are so blatantly wrong.   It was only supposed to be a light covering at 2pm.

Back to the weather itself, it was terrible and the snow threw Nick Foles off of his game for most of the first half and part of the second.  It was understandable because the wind and snow made an effective passing game nearly impossible.  The Eagles offense was facing a Lions run defense, which was third in the league.  LeSean McCoy had been able to run for 51 yards in the first half, but they needed much more in the second half with the weather limiting the passing game.

The other problem the Birds were facing was a horrible game from their special teams coverage units, namely the punt team and the kickoff team.  Lions return man Jeremy Ross returned a punt 58-yards for a touchdown, then later in the game, he returned a kickoff 98-yards for a touchdown.

The Eagles had their back up against the wall.

You don’t usually win games with your special teams allowing two returns for touchdowns and your passing game held under two hundred yards.  The key word there is usually.  Yesterday was not a usual day for the Birds running game.

McCoy bailed out Foles and the Birds special teams by having a record-setting second half.  That’s why football is such a great team sport, you can bail out your teammates and that’s what McCoy and the offensive line did.  The inside trio of center Jason Kelce and guards Evan Mathis and Todd Herremans did a great job of handling the Lions two big monster defensive tackles Ndamukong Sugh and Nick Fairley.

Shady and the running game exploded in the second half for 166 yards and that included touchdown runs of 57 and 40 yards.  The key to their success was McCoy changing his running style in the snow.  The former Pittsburgh Panther was dancing and running laterally in the first half.  In the second half, he started running straight ahead, simply hitting the hole as soon as possible.  He limited his dancing, juking and lateral bursts.

With that change, the NFL’s leading rusher started finding seams, then big holes in the Lions rush defense and he took advantage of them.  McCoy finished with 217 yards rushing, which broke Hall-of-Famer, Steve Van Buren’s record of 205 yards, set back in 1949.

“It was tough,” McCoy said. “It was definitely tough. Normal footing and traction that we get from stopping and cutting, I couldn’t really plant like I usually plant. But the [offensive linemen] were giving me so much room.

“And it’s a mental thing. Obviously it’s going to be tough because it’s the snow and the weather, but you don’t think about it while you’re running. Only if you think about it, it sets you back a little bit.”

This Eagles team passed another test yesterday.  They had been struggling in the fourth quarters and unable to put teams away.  The offense hadn’t scored a point in the fourth quarter in the last four games.  It all changed yesterday with 28 points in the fourth and they came back for the victory.