What went wrong on Eagles' final drive vs. Panthers? A look at the film

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Since the end of the Eagles’ 21-17 loss to the Panthers on Sunday afternoon, most fans and reporters have been playing the blame game. 

It’s the defense’s fault. It’s the offense’s fault. It’s the coaching. In reality, it takes a team effort to blow a 17-point lead in the fourth quarter. 

So, sure, the defense gave up 21 points, but Carson Wentz and his unit had the ball late with a chance to win the game and they couldn’t get it done. 

Let’s examine how that happened: 

We’ll skip the deep 48-yard defensive pass interference, but that’s not to say it wasn’t a great play. It was. At a crucial moment, Wentz threw the deep ball perfectly to Alshon Jeffery, who blew past the coverage. But he got hit early and the flag came out immediately. Not much to show there. 

We’ll pick up from after the deep DPI. 

It’s 1st-and-10 from the Carolina 22-yard line with 1:11 left in the game. The game nearly ends here in complete disaster. Wentz is in shotgun and this looks like an RPO, Wentz wisely decides to throw. Zach Ertz is circled at the top of the line. 

There’s going to be a miscommunication between Wentz and Ertz that nearly leads to a disaster. There’s what Ertz ran and what it looked like Wentz expected. 

Ertz runs a post and looks wide open, but it looks like Wentz expected Ertz to get a little deeper on his route. You see where Ertz is. Wentz throws it into the pocket behind him. 

Eric Reid intercepts the ball, but the review shows the ball hit the ground and it’s ruled as an incomplete pass. The Eagles lucked out there, but they get new life. 

It’s now 2nd-and-10 from the 22 with 1:06 left. I love that Wentz checks out of whatever play they were in to this run from Wendell Smallwood. The Eagles are banking that Smallwood will be quick enough to get through the line leaving the RDE unblocked, that way Jason Peters can get downfield and get a hat on Thomas Davis. 

It works. Smallwood busts through the line. Now, Peters is in front of him on Davis and there’s some daylight. 

You could argue here that Smallwood could have bounced it outside. There’s a lot of room there, but I can’t fault him for this play. He showed the burst already and now he’s going to show some power. He’s only picked up about three yards so far at this point, but he’s about to get another five — a couple after Luke Kuechly already grabbed him. 

The Eagles don’t get a first down, but they pick up eight big yards to set up a 3rd-and-short with under a minute remaining. 

It’s 3rd-and-2 after that run. The Eagles need to get to the Carolina 12-yard line to pick up the first down, but Wentz has something bigger on his mind. 

Just before the snap, Kuechly showed blitz, but by the time the ball is snapped, he’s already backed off. Jeffery is running a deep post and won't be open, but Wentz is going to throw it into double coverage anyway. 

Wentz sees Smallwood open in the flat. Maybe he’s worried that he won’t get to the first-down marker, but this was the right play. Meanwhile, Kuechly has dropped deep and is clearly keying on Jeffery, who was in the slot. 

This is the worst look of all. As the ball leaves Wentz’s hand, Jeffery is already doubled. Wentz has to see the linebacker drop into coverage and he just can’t make this throw. Really, he’s lucky it wasn’t picked. Meanwhile, Smallwood is WIDE open in the flat. Easy first down, move the chains, get a few shots to the end zone. Even Nelson Agholor is more open on this play. 

It ends up being one of the worst decisions I’ve seen Wentz make. It’s hard to kill him too much because he’s trying to be aggressive, but sometimes you gotta take what the defense gives you. 

Now, it’s 4th-and-2 from the Panthers’ 14-yard line and the game is on the line with just 31 seconds left. But there’s plenty of time. The Eagles still have two timeouts. They just have to find a way to get two yards. 

Wentz isn’t going to have time to deliver this ball. When Brandon Brooks passes off Kyle Love, Johnson was already too deep to get any leverage and Julius Peppers is somehow still coming this strong in his 100th NFL season. He gets enough push on Brooks to get a hand in there and force a fumble to end the game. 

The thing that hurts for the Eagles is that if Wentz has a split second longer, he delivers this ball to a wide-open Jeffery in the middle of the field. 

As bad as the Eagles’ defense was on Sunday in that fourth quarter, the offense still had a chance to get it done. They got down the field on one play thanks to that DPI, but then stalled. This wasn’t game plan, this wasn’t coaching, this was a lack of execution in the waning moments of the game. It’s a tough way for it to end. 

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