NEW ORLEANS: The Philadelphia Eagles obliterated the Kansas City Chiefs’ bid to become the first NFL team to win three consecutive Super Bowls with a blowout 40-22 win in New Orleans on Sunday.
The Eagles defense was simply immense, smothering the Chief’s creative maestro Patrick Mahomes, and on offense their own quarterback Jalen Hurts led the way, throwing for two touchdowns and running for another as Philadelphia brutally avenged their 2023 loss to the Chiefs at Super Bowl 57.
Eagles dazzling running back Saquon Barkley grabbed 31 first-half rushing yards to break the all-time NFL record for most rushing yards in a regular season plus playoffs, to add icing to the Eagles’ championship cake.
Sunday’s thumping victory delivered a second Super Bowl win for the Eagles franchise whose other title win was in 2018.
It was a commanding performance throughout by the Eagles who totally dominated the championship match in front of a crowd that included US President Donald Trump and pop superstar Taylor Swift.
It marked the first time a sitting president had attended a Super Bowl and Trump watched the first half before leaving.
The Eagles set the tone for the contest by opening the scoring in the first quarter with their signature play – a goal line move they call the “brotherly shove” – with Hurts plowing into the end zone behind his powerful offensive line as his teammates forced him forward.
Eagles’ rookie defensive back Cooper DeJean picked off a poor pass from Mahomes in the second quarter to score Philadelphia’s second touchdown and Hurts then found A.J. Brown with a 12-yard pass to go into halftime 24-0 ahead.
Mahomes struggled mightily in the first half, throwing two interceptions while being sacked three times and completing just 6-of-14 passing attempts.
Things went from bad to worse in the second half for the Chiefs when Hurts found DeVonta Smith with a 46-yard pass for a fourth touchdown and take a 34-0 lead.
The Chiefs finally got on the scoreboard late in the third quarter through Xavier Worthy, but the game was sliding away at breakneck pace.
A DeAndre Hopkins touchdown, and a second for Worthy added some respectability to the score, but it was cosmetic, and would have come as little consolation to the battered Chiefs whose tilt at history was devastatingly denied.
Nobody had predicted the one-sided nature of the game – not Trump, not Swift, not Argentine World Cup winner Lionel Messi, hip-hop mogul Jay-Z or Beatle Paul McCartney who were all in the crowd – but the Eagles defense was awesome throughout, never giving the Chiefs a chance.
It was nothing short of a blowout to end a week when football took on a Mardi Gras flavor with New Orleans hosting the game for a record-tying 11th time.
Eagles deny Chiefs historic three-peat in thumping Super Bowl win
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Eagles deny Chiefs historic three-peat in thumping Super Bowl win
- Thumping NFL victory delivers a second Super Bowl win for the Eagles franchise whose other title win was in 2018
- It was a commanding performance throughout by the Eagles who totally dominated the championship match
Sweden’s Ekstrom takes Dakar stage seven win in Saudi Arabia
- Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiyah stays top in the car category
WADI AL-DAWASI: Mattias Ekstrom won stage seven of the Dakar Rally on Sunday as the field started the second week in Saudi Arabia with late drama for Toyota’s Henk Lategan while Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiyah stayed top in the car category.
South African Lategan had looked like taking the stage and overall lead but let both slip through his fingers after the day’s final checkpoint.
Instead, Sweden’s Ekstrom, winner of the prologue in a Ford Raptor, became the first driver in the top car category to take more than one stage this year.
Lategan had led Ekstrom after 417 of 459km from Riyadh to Wadi Al-Dawasir, but finished eight minutes and 35 seconds behind the winner after having to stop for 10 minutes at the 428km mark.
Ekstrom moved up to second overall, four minutes and 47 seconds behind Dacia Sandriders’ five-times Dakar winner Al-Attiyah with Lategan third.
Spaniard Nani Roma was fourth for Ford after being reinstated by stewards late on Saturday’s rest day as winner of stage five and having a one minute and 10 second penalty rescinded.
In the motorcycle category, Australian Daniel Sanders extended his lead over American rival Ricky Brabec to four minutes and 25 seconds with Argentine rider Luciano Benavides a further 15 seconds adrift.
Sanders had been a mere 45 seconds clear after Friday’s sixth stage but Honda’s Brabec finished the 459km stage 10th to the Australian’s fourth.
Argentine Benavides won the stage, his second triumph of the event, in a one-two for the Red Bull KTM factory team with Spaniard Edgar Canet, while Honda’s French challenger Adrien Van Beveren was third.
Monday’s 481km stage eight is the longest of the race with riders and drivers navigating canyons and dunes around Wadi Ad Dawasir.
