PHILADELPHIA – Smooth, confident, controlled.
That’s how Atlanta Falcons left tackle Jake Matthews described quarterback Kirk Cousins during the team’s game-winning drive within the last two minutes of the team’s comeback 22-21 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles on “Monday Night Football.”
“He didn’t blink,” Matthews said.
Cousins acted as though he were on the practice field.
“You could tell he’d been there before,” said Matthews, an 11-year veteran who started his career blocking for Matt Ryan in Atlanta.
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It was still an unfamiliar outcome for Cousins in a familiar setting – he’s now faced the Eagles 12 times as a pro (record: 7-5), with eight of those contests coming at Lincoln Financial Field. It was his 14th “MNF” game, and for a player with a less-than-sterling prime-time reputation, playing under the lights was another opportunity to show why he deserved $100 million in guarantees from the Falcons as a free agent this offseason despite coming off a torn Achilles tendon.
Cousins is now 4-1 in his last five “MNF” appearances. Following a stroke of luck when Eagles running back Saquon Barkley dropped a wide-open third-down pass to gift the Falcons an additional 40 seconds to erase a six-point deficit, Cousins drove the Falcons 70 yards in six plays. He hit wideout Drake London for a 7-yard touchdown that tied the game.
“Kirk was making great throws,” said cornerback Darius Slay, who was beat by London on a route to the front-right pylon for the crucial score. “Got to tip your hat to him.”
Younghoe Koo’s 48-yard extra point – the 15-yard penalty was due to London’s unsportsmanlike conduct penalty – was the difference.
“Straight poise,” London said of Cousins. “He knows what he’s doing. We trust in him. Wherever he puts the ball, we got to catch it.”
Cousins finished 20-of-29 with 241 passing yards and two touchdowns. Most of the damage came in the second half, when he was 13-for-16 with 166 yards and had a 149.5 passer rating.
While facing skepticism about whether he’d fully recovered from his season-ending Achilles injury last year after he took nearly every snap out of shotgun or pistol formations in the Week 1 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers, Cousins appeared to move comfortably, took snaps under center – including the first three of the game – and performed play-action. The Falcons were in shotgun for 30 of 58 offensive plays, including all six on the final possession.
The game’s crucial drive started on the Falcons’ 30-yard line with 1:39 remaining. Cousins hit tight end Kyle Pitts for an 11-yard gain to open the series. He then connected with Darnell Mooney on nearly identical out routes to the left sideline for pickups of 21 and 26 yards, respectively. Three plays later, London was (excessively) celebrating.
“It reminds you of when you’re in practice, running the two-minute drill, everything’s clicking,” Matthews said. “It’s easier said than done, but to carry that over into the game, you make it happen that smooth, it’s a testament to how we prepared. We were ready for the moment.”
Coming from behind on the road in one of the league’s toughest environments builds resolve and grit, Cousins said, that “we’re going to have to lean on as the year goes on.”
“This is how NFL football is, you know, and so we’ve got to kind of get used to this and get comfortable in this, because that’s how these games tend to go,” Cousins said, “and so the more we can be battle-tested and have these moments, I think it would set us up well for what’s coming down the road.”
But winning on “MNF” didn’t mean anything special to him.
“I just try to go out and play football the best I can, whether it’s noon on Sunday or, you know, a night game, what day of the week it is,” Cousins said.
Winning during the postseason is what counts, said head coach Raheem Morris, who earned his first non-interim win as the Falcons’ head coach.
“We’re a long way from that,” Morris said. “We have to get out here and try to put ourselves in a position to get into those competitive moments so we can show those things. We haven’t shown that yet. We’ve shown it (in) that we’ve shown the fact that we can go into somebody else’s stadium and win a game, and we’re showing we can win in a two-minute drive, and those are important for us to go find out.”
At the team hotel Sunday night, Cousins ran into Nick Foles – honored Monday for his Super Bowl heroics and serving as the team’s honorary captain – and his parents. He hadn’t seen Foles’ parents since he and Foles were freshmen at Michigan State University in 2007.
Thinking back over the last 17 years resurfaced a lot of memories for Cousins – and gratitude.
“I was kind of reminded, with him getting honored tonight, and said to him at the coin toss, ‘You know, it worked out.’ It worked out for both of us,” said Cousins of Foles, who later transferred to the University of Arizona. “And so, I was just reflecting (Sunday night and Monday) a little bit on our journeys.
“So, playing here tonight kind of brought back a lot of those memories on my journey, and it was a fun way to win it.”
