Eagles head coach Doug Pederson had finally had enough.
Trailing 20-3 to the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field with 7:39 left in the third quarter, his team headed for its fourth consecutive loss, the coach pulled his franchise quarterback Carson Wentz in replaced him with rookie Jalen Hurts, the second round pick out of Oklahoma.
The strategy worked, somewhat. The Eagles (3-8-1) still lost, but Hurts showed some signs he could play.
After Hurts' first drive behind center for real stalled at Green Bay 41, Aaron Rogers came back and led the Pack on a 14-play 72-yard drive that ended with a Mason Crosby 40-yard field goal to make the score 23-3 early in the fourth quarter.
Over, right?
Not quite. Hurts led the Birds on a nine-play 73-yard drive that ended with a 32-yard touchdown pass from Hurts to Greg Ward. The score was 23-10 and CBS announcers Tony Romo and Jim Nantz started talking about the game again.
The touchdown seemed to energize the team as Jim Schwartz's defense produced a Green Bay three-and-out.
Eagles first round pick Jalen Reagor woke up every living room in the Delaware Valley when he took the 52-yard punt from JK Scott, muffed the catch, and raced 73-yards for a touchdown closing the gap to 23-16 (Jake Elliott missed the extra point).
"At the time. I just felt like, where we were as an offense, we needed a spark,” Pederson said after the game. “We needed something to kind of go our way and so I decided to put Jalen in the game.”
As it turned out, that was all the scoring the Birds had in them for the day.
The Eagles defense was able to force another three-and-out but so was the Packers defense.
With 3:03 left in the fourth quarter and a full compliment of timeouts, Pederson decided to punt from the Eagles 38-yard line.
On the second play of the Packers drive, running back Aaron Jones steamrolled through it seems like all 11 Eagles players 77 yards for a touchdown producing the final score 30-16.
Hurts tried one more rally but was hit while throwing a pass on third-and-ten at the Green Bay
33 and was intercepted by strong safety Darnell Savage and that pretty much ended the game.
Hurts finished 5 for 12 for 109 yards, a touchdown pass and an interception. He was sacked three times.
Wentz was 6 of 15 for 79 yards. He was sacked four times.
Rogers was 25 of 34 for 295 yards and three touchdown passes. He did not turn the ball over but was sacked twice.
Jones finished with 130 yards on 15 carries for Green Bay.
Miles Sanders rushed 10 times for 31 yards. Hurts rushed five times for 29 yards. *
Follow Al Thompson on Twitter @thompsoniii
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