Super Bowl: The Season in Review
This is one of the strangest Super Bowl’s in NFL History. This Super Bowl will have the Philadelphia Eagles vs. the New England Patriots : Two very different teams. The Philadelphia Eagles have now won their first Super Bowl, while the Patriots have made the most Super Bowl’s with 10 appearances in the big game. Let’s take a look at both of these team’s paths to the Super Bowl.
Let’s start with the Underdogs, The Eagles had their starting quarterback Carson Wentz tear his ACL on week 14 in a win over the Rams. Since then the Eagles, with Nick Foles at Quarterback, have been the underdogs. The second year Head Coach Doug Pederson has led the Eagles to a 13-3 record in the regular season.
The offense of the Eagles are ranked as the 6th best offense in the league with a good offensive line and some offensive weapons such as Jay Ajayi, Alshon Jeffery, and Zach Ertz.
They rank the 3rd best in points and 3rd best in Rushing Yards. After making a trade halfway through the season for Jay Ajayi, the Eagles have had a 1-2 punch with Jay Ajayi and LeGarrette Blount in the backfield. Also with the free agent signing of Torrey Smith and Alshon Jeffery this season has given the Eagles a good Wide Receiver core to work with. Zach Ertz is the go to player in the Red Zone, with a 42% usage rate within the 20 yard line, I can see why he caught all 8 of his touchdowns in the Red Zone.
This offense has came along way since last year with their 16th ranked offense and a 24th ranked passing offense; now a top 10 team in passing. On the Defensive side, the Eagles are stacked with Malcolm Jenkins, Fletcher Cox, and Brandon Graham. The Eagles defense was ranked as a top 7 defense with the best rushing defense, the 4th lowest points scored, and the 4th fewest yards against.
This team has made great strides to improve and deserve to end the year with their first Super Bowl win ever.
Now onto the New England Patriots. The Patriots are the obvious Favorites for many reasons. The Patriots are ranked the 2nd best offense in the league with the most total yards and 2nd best in points scored, and passings yards. They finished the regular season with a 13-3 record and 1st in the AFC. This is impressive but sort of expected from the defending Champions. With Bill Belichick as the head coach, and having an Offensive Coordinator and Defensive Coordinator who have guaranteed Head Coaching jobs next year.
The Patriots should have no problem scoring the ball. With one of the G.O.A.T. leading the offense and Gronk and Brandin Cooks catching passes the Patriots have coasted through the season with no problems.
On the defensive side with pro bowlers like Stephon GIlmore, Devin McCourty, and Malcolm Butler. The Defense has struggled through week 4 allowing a league worst 421 yards per game; the defense has now turned around to have a top 10 defense with only allowing 260 yards per game. The defense has turned around and showed their dominance.
Now that the game has passed we saw the Philadelphia Eagles win their first Super Bowl with a score of 41-33 with the Patriots failing to score in the last minutes of the game. Nick Foles was named Super Bowl MVP with a 133 passer rating.
This Super Bowl had many broken records. Both teams combined to have over 1000 yards combined which beat the last record by almost 300 yards. And to top it off had the most passing yards combined in Super Bowl History.
One thing is for sure, these two teams have fought a long way to get to the most important game in the season. So it wasn’t a surprise that this game was one for the ages.
