September 05, 2025

Eagles vs. Cowboys Week 1 observations: Pass offense looks the same, defense made big stops, Eagles win another opener

Eagles defensive tackles work overtime, Saquon Barkley still carried a heavy workload, Quinyon Mitchell traveled and other observations from the

By Geoff Mosher
PhillyVoice Staff

Colleen Claggett/for PhillyVoice

Quinyon Mitchell #27 of the Philadelphia Eagles tackles George Pickens #3 of the Dallas Cowboys during a NFL football game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Philadelphia Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field on September 4, 2025 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Everything seemed perfect at the Linc. Fireworks lit the sky. A championship banner was unfurled. "Jump Around" blared over the loudspeaker. Chants of "Dallas Sucks" soon reverberated around the sold-out stadium.

It was a perfect Thursday evening for the Eagles and their fans – and then came kickoff. Ben VanSumeren went down on the opening kick, and while the medical staff helped him into a cart, flags flew as Jalen Carter had spit on Dak Prescott to get ejected before the teams could huddle up for the first offensive snap.

Then the Cowboys went 53 yards and scored a touchdown for the early lead. And then the game just got weird.

Personal fouls kept coming. Jalen Hurts burned the Cowboys with long runs. CeeDee Lamb burned the Eagles because he's CeeDee Lamb. Miles Sanders came back to haunt the Eagles with a 49-yard run, then came back to help the Eagles by fumbling. Lightning caused a long delay.

In the end, the Eagles held onto to win, 24-20, after Lamb failed to corral a deep ball on 4th-and-3 with less than 2 minutes to play after sprawling out and taking a little contact from Cooper DeJean.

Here's a whole bunch of interesting observations, notes and nuggets from a weird, wild NFL opener...

The defensive interior played a whole lot

The byproduct of Jalen Carter's ejection wasn't just leaving the Eagles without their best overall lineman but also forced Jordan Davis and Moro Ojomo into barely leaving the field. They held up in the first half but Dallas tried came out in the second half with a ground-and-pound approach, running on its first three plays and four of the first five, the fourth being Miles Sanders' 49-yard scamper down the left side. But as the Eagles know too well, Sanders can giveth and taketh away. The former Eagles running back's fumble three plays later – caused by Byron Young and Jihaad Campbell – saved the Eagles from falling behind again. the lightning delay might have actually helped the d-linemen recharge as the defense came up with some critical fourth-quarter four-man rushes. It didn't appear that Vic Fangio blitzed very much, although he threw a timely blitz on that final pass from Prescott to Lamb that fell incomplete.

The pass offense showed some evolution but was it better?

Right from the start, the Eagles showed a ton of motion, shifting, even some misdirection as Kevin Patullo made his debut as offensive coordinator. It's funny, because that was supposed to be Kellen Moore's thing, but Moore eventually ditched a lot of that stuff and went more basic. Patullo is benefitting by being with the team since Nick Sirianni arrived in 2021, so plenty of experience with Hurts, and also from an offense that replaced just one starter, on the o-line. On the fourth offensive snap, the Eagles aligned three tights on the right side of the line and then ran a left-side pitch to Saquon Barkley that went for 16 yards. The Eagles talked a lot about evolving as an offense, and being a new iteration, and it certainly was on display for the opener. But overall, the results of the pass game didn't look very different. A.J. Brown was basically invisible, so was DeVonta Smith against a Dallas secondary that had guys who missed a whole lot of time in camp.

That was a vintage Jalen Hurts/Eagles offense game

I actually wrote in my notebook when Hurts completed consecutive passes inside the hashes to Dallas Goedert – not his strongest asset – on the Eagles' second possession, and then was vintage Hurts a few plays later by ignoring A.J. Brown crossing inside the 5-yard-line and just running in an 8-yard TD. All of Hurts' best attributes were on display early – signature third-down runs and a beautiful deep ball to Jahan Dotson down the right seam that Dotson caught in stride for 51 yards – on 3rd-and-6. Not a lot of QBs make that decision on 3rd-and-6. In the second half, not so much as the Eagles punted on two of their first three possessions after the break and then gave the ball bacl to Dallas with about three minutes to go in the fourth after another 3-and-out.

Quinyon Mitchell shadowed, but the CB2 battle wasn't encouraging

We didn't have to wait very long for two things – Vic Fangio using Quinyon Mitchell in shadow coverage, and for Fangio to get tired of Adoree' Jackson. Mitchell shadowed George Pickens for the game – he won more than he lost and held Pickens in check – but Jackson struggled against CeeDee Lamb, who mainly lined up to the field or slot as he typically does. Lamb had four catches for 86 yards in the first half, and Fangio went to Jakorian Bennett on Dallas' fourth possession. He was immediately flagged for DPI, on his very first Eagles snap. A few plays later, he got beat by Lamb on a 10-yard slant to get Dallas into field goal position with 15 seconds to go in the half. Jackson was back to start the second half, left briefly in the second half to get evalauted for a concussion but returned after the lightning delay. Interestingly, Mitchell didn't cover Pickens on 3rd-and-5 late in the fourth, and Dak Prescott went right to Pickens for a 15-yard catch.

The Cowboys missed Micah Parsons (duh)

But actually more for his experience than his pass rush acumen. Hurts capitalized on Dallas' young edge rushers, who got way too north and too wide with their rush lanes early in the game, giving Hurts plenty of green to expose with his legs. Two of the Eagles' first three third-down conversions came via Hurts escaping the pocket and moving the sticks with his legs, including his TD run on the opening drive and a 15-yarder on 3rd-and-5 on the second drive, and then again a few plays later on his 8-yard TD run.

Cowboys defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus made some adjustments after the break, sending more pressure but also scheming to keep Hurts in the pocket, which led to Hurts getting sacked by Marshawn Kneeland and then getting hit on a hurried incomplete pass on the Eagles' opening possession of the third, leading to a Jake Elliott 58-yarder – the first Eagles possession that didn't result in a touchdown.

UPDATE: The Cowboys blitzed Jalen Hurts on 2 of 5 dropbacks on the Eagles' opening drive of the second half, generating a pressure on both blitzes, including a Marshawn Kneeland sack.
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) September 5, 2025

Did the Eagles "lighten Saquon's load?"

What do you think? He had 12 touches in the first half (10 runs, two receptions on three targets) and finished with 21 in total – a pace for 357 touches over 17 games if you're into math. It probably didn't help that Will Shipley left with a concussion and Ben VanSumeren was injured on the opening kick, but the Eagles will give Barkley the ball when the game is tight, and there was never a moment when the game wasn't tight. And given the schedule, they'll probably be in a bunch of tight games.

If BenVanSumeren is out for long again, it'll hurt

I'm still convinced the Eagles hid their intentions for Ben VanSumeren's role in the offense in the preseason, and now we might never know what those plans were if VanSumeren is out for the season, or just for a really long time. The Eagles occasionally used Kylen Granson in an H-back type role, and Granson has some catch-and-run abilities, but any extended VanSumeren absence will probably force the Eagles to ditch that role and go with more basic two tight-end formations.

Vic Fangio clearly doesn't prefer a deep EDGE rotation

Last year, Fangio had no problem relying on Josh Sweat, Nolan Smith and Jalyx Hunt to handle the majority of EDGE snaps after Bryce Huff was rendered a) ineffective and b) injured, and after Brandon Graham went down with a torn triceps. It appears Fangio just doesn't feel like he needs a Jim Schwartzian type of edge rotation, because Azeez Ojulari was a surprise inactive, leaving Fangio to lean heavily on Smith, Hunt and Josh Uche. The pass rush had some moments, but Prescott generally didn't face a ton of pressure. Once again, Fangio showed that he doesn't care about someone's contract. Ojulari signed a one-year deal for $4 million this offseason while Uche inked a 1-year deal with $1.25 million guaranteed.

The rookies did OK

When you play rookies, you'll get some energetic plays and some mistakes. First-rounder Jihaad Campbell and second-rounder Andrew Mukuba each started. Campbell showed his tremendous range and athleticism, breaking up a pass from Dak Prescott down the right seam to TE Brevyn Spann-Ford, and teamed with Byron Young on the Sanders fumble, but he also struggled at times to get off blocks, including on Sanders' 49-yard run. Mukuba generally played well. He started but Sydney Brown also played in some packages as Fangio still looks for the right personnel for the right down-and-distances.

Blast from the past

In my 21 seasons covering the Eagles, I couldn't remember a single time an Eagle was ejected before the first offensive or defensive snap of the game. And then it hit me – it happened my first season, but I wasn't there. Eagles linebacker Jeremiah Trotter – senior, not junior – was ejected in the 2005 season opener in Atlanta after getting into a pre-game altercation on the field with Falcons cornerback Kevin Mathis.

You can read about it here, but this story doesn't mention the involvement of Ike Reese, who had left the Eagles in free agency for the Falcons and, if I recall correctly, was an instigator.

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