{"id":72452,"date":"2025-12-29T03:35:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T03:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/72452\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T03:35:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T03:35:08","slug":"eagles-lean-on-defense-in-great-battle-test-against-bills","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/72452\/","title":{"rendered":"Eagles lean on defense in ‘great battle test’ against Bills"},"content":{"rendered":"

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The Eagles<\/a> defense rose to the occasion Sunday, delivering a goal-line stand in the second half and surviving a two-point conversion at the end of regulation to help Philadelphia escape with a 14-13 win<\/a> over the Buffalo Bills<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Eagles (11-5) blanked the NFL’s No. 3 scoring offense for three-plus quarters before Buffalo (11-5) struck twice in the final moments, including on a 1-yard Josh Allen<\/a> touchdown run with five seconds remaining.<\/p>\n

Coach Sean McDermott opted to go for two, but Allen’s pass to Khalil Shakir<\/a> in the back of the end zone was off the mark.<\/p>\n

“Wanted to be aggressive, going for the win,” McDermott said. “We feel like only a certain amount of time left at that point and felt like we had a great call, great opportunity to go win it, and I’m gonna be aggressive, so I’m not gonna sit back.”<\/p>\n

It was the second time the Bills were denied at the doorstep. Buffalo looked poised to score late in the third quarter following a 32-yard pass from Allen to Tyrell Shavers<\/a> but the Eagles defense stood firm at the goal line, including on fourth down when linebacker Zack Baun<\/a> stopped Allen’s scramble attempt inches short.<\/p>\n

“I like to consider us the eye of the storm,” defensive tackle Jordan Davis<\/a> said. “While everything else is swirling around us, we’re in the middle, we’re calm. Everything can be messy as hell at the end of the day but when we’re in the eye of the storm, everything is calm, we’ve got to keep ourselves composed.”<\/p>\n

Davis’ former Georgia teammate, Jalen Carter<\/a>, returned from an extended absence following a shoulder procedure and made a major impact. He registered a sack and a tackle for loss and blocked the extra point following Buffalo’s first touchdown, in what proved to be the difference in the game.<\/p>\n

Carter said film study paid off, just as it did earlier in the season when he and Davis each recorded a blocked field goal.<\/p>\n

“We call it the fish, who we feel like is almost the weakest guy or the weakest side…I feel like the fish was on the side that we got the block on today,” Carter said. “I just trusted the guys next to me. We got a good knockback and after you get a knockback of about two to three steps, you want to just jump as high as you can and get the block.”<\/p>\n

The Eagles offense was shut out in the second half and has lacked consistency for the better part of the season, but it’s backed by a defense that continues to prove it’s among the league’s best.<\/p>\n

“This was a great battle test for us. Because it’s about to get real hard every week,” defensive lineman Brandon Graham<\/a> said. “I do [feel like it’s a championship defense]. I really do. We’re building towards that.”<\/p>\n

Information from ESPN’s Alaina Getzenberg was used in this report.br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2025 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The Eagles defense rose to the occasion Sunday, delivering a goal-line stand in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[37814,6621,1421,139,1418,69,4538,71,70],"class_list":{"0":"post-72452","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-37814","9":"tag-buffalo-bills","10":"tag-espn","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-philadelphia","14":"tag-philadelphia-eagles","15":"tag-philadelphia-headlines","16":"tag-philadelphia-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}