Nick Sirianni admits Eagles “played a really bad game today offensively”

The Eagles suffered a really, really ugly loss on Sunday against the Saints, and head coach Nick Sirianni admitted that the NFL can be humbling, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. He mentioned that their goals are still in front of them, and they have a chance to finish the season 14-3 and win the NFC East next week against the Giants.

“Our goal from the very beginning has just always been about taking it one day at a time, and trying to go 1-0 each day in attempts to go 1-0 this week. And this week, we gotta — obviously, was disappointing what we did today. Coaching, playing, everything. But, next week, we’ll have a chance to win the division title at home.”

As for why the offense struggled so much on Sunday, Sirianni noted that they had to give credit to the Saints defense, who he said was well-coached and had good players. The head coach also said that they didn’t put players in good enough position to succeed, and they didn’t execute well enough.

Sirianni said that he’d have to watch the tape, but they didn’t really have any kind of rhythm going in the first half, pointing to having three 3-and-outs.

“When you’re not converting on third down — I mean, it’s hard to convert on the one that was 3rd-and-forever, but when you’re not converting on third down, or you’re not getting drives sustained, it’s hard to get into a rhythm. And that’s exactly what happened.”

The head coach said it’ll always first come back to him and the coaches, as well as execution.

Sirianni was asked about his level of concern that the team is struggling this late in the season, but he explained that they will take things one day at a time and get better from Sunday’s loss. He tries not to get too high when they’re playing well, or too low when they’re not.

“We played a really bad game today offensively, so we’ll just have to look and get better from it. But I don’t — again, I’m not ever gonna be somebody that is going to hit a panic button. We’re going to double down on the things we think are true, that we know are true, and we’re going to get better from this. And, that’s all we can do. I mean, we gotta own what we just did, what we put out there, and get better from it by owning it, correcting the mistakes with great detail.”

The head coach was also quick to shrug off any indication that the holding call against Landon Dickerson had a big impact, saying that it’s never going to be about one play. He went on to say that it doesn’t matter whether or not he thought it was a hold, because it wasn’t the reason they lost the game.

Sirianni said he’ll have to watch the tape to evaluate Gardner Minshew’s performance, but admitted the QB would probably want some of the plays back. He pointed out that Marshon Lattimore had a big interception at a critical moment, but the head coach will need to watch the film to understand why it happened — he didn’t want to comment on it until he had a more thorough look.

“Obviously it wasn’t Gardner’s best game, and it wasn’t out best game as an offense, and it wasn’t even close. Gardner’s capable of playing better, we’re capable of coaching better, and we’re capable of playing better as an entire unit.”

The failed QB sneak is another play that Sirianni will need to see on film before commenting. It’s a play they’ve had a lot of success with this season, but that particular one didn’t work out. Again, he gave credit to the Saints for getting a big stop there.

He later said that Jalen Hurts was close to playing this week, so they’re still taking things one day a time but it’s a little early for Sirianni to make any sort of announcement about his availability for next week’s game. The head coach said that if Hurts is medically cleared to play, he’ll play.