The New Orleans Saints Sunday afternoon started out about as horribly as possible with Drew Brees throwing an interception on the first play from scirmmage. However, the Saints were able to overcome their early miscues and come away with a 20-14 win over the Philadelphia Eagles to make it to their third ever NFC Championship Game.
After the aforementioned interception, Nick Foles led the Eagles down the field and found the end zone on a 37-yard pass to Jordan Matthews to take the early lead. After forcing a three-and-out on the next drive, Foles found paydirt much like Drew Brees does with a quick leap over line to take a 14-0 lead late in the first quarter.
After another three-and-out by the Saints offense, it felt like Philadelphia was about to start running away with it much like the Patriots did earlier in the day. However, Marshon Lattimore came up huge with an interception early in the second quarter to turn the tide. The Saints responded with a 12-play drive that was sparked by a fake punt by Taysom Hill and saw Brees connect with Keith Kirkwood on 4th-and-goal from the two-yard line to make it 14-7 with 7:23 left until halftime. Wil Lutz made it a four-point deficit with a late field goal from 45 yards out.
The Eagles started the second half with a three-and-out, which gave the Saints a chance to put together a methodical drive. They did just that with an 18-play drive that took a whopping 13 minutes off the clock and resulted in Brees finding Michael Thomas in the end zone to take the lead for the first time all afternoon.
New Orleans wasn’t out of the woods just yet, even after a field goal in the fourth quarter by Wil Lutz only made it a four-point game. Things weren’t looking great with the Eagles taking over with 2:58 left in regulation. The Eagles were marching down the field and were able to get all the way to the Saints 27-yard-line just before the two-minute warning. However, instead of taking the clock down to the two-minute warning, Foles was picked off by Lattimore for the second time and that sealed the defending Super Bowl Champion’s fate.
The Saints will return to action on Sunday when they host the Los Angeles Rams with kickoff set for 2:05 pm.
-Clint Domingue