Eagles' embattled duo find way back to brink of Super Bowl

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- For the fifth time in the past eight years, Philadelphia Eagles coach Andy Reid is going to the NFC Championship Game. Only this time it's different ... and, I would imagine, more satisfying.

Reid's Eagles were the conference's sixth and last seed, sneaking into the playoffs the last day of the season after Tampa Bay and Chicago caved. He withstood a roller-coaster year where critics called for his firing, as well as the firing of his star quarterback. Most important, he got there by knocking off the defending Super Bowl champions.

That's right, he beat the New York Freaking Giants. Go ahead and gloat, Andy Reid. The time, as you would say, is yours.

"I'm proud of the team," he said after the Eagles shredded the Giants 23-11 on Sunday.

Nice try. After what Reid has been through this season, he deserves to vent. This is the stage, and here is his chance.

"I don't go there," Reid said, smiling. "I'm proud of the guys. They played. They trusted each other, and they believed. I couldn't be happier for them."

Me? I couldn't be happier for Reid. I don't know another coach with his résumé who suffers the dissection and criticism he undergoes each season. Play calling, personnel, game management ... you name it, Reid has been skewered for it.

When, for instance, he benched quarterback Donovan McNabb in the second half of a November game in Baltimore, and the season looked lost, outraged fans called for Reid's firing ... and they weren't alone.

Columnists started questioning if he was the right man for the job, and if the Eagles might be better off with someone else like, oh, say, Giants defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, a former Reid assistant.

But Reid never fired back, responding instead by pulling his team together for a run that has seen them win six of their past seven -- including two defeats of the Giants at Giants Stadium.

Andy Reid has the most wins of any NFC coach since 2000. (Gaming Original Feed)

"I think redemption is too strong a word," said Eagles owner Jeff Lurie. "He's just a quality person and a very good leader. And he is what he always is -- a winner."

Precisely.

Reid's record will stand up to almost anyone's. He has been Coach of the Year twice. He has more victories, a better winning percentage and more playoff victories than anyone in Philadelphia history. More important, since 2000 he has more overall wins than any NFC coach.

Yet that's not enough for some Philadelphia fans, who complain about their head coach as often as they do their quarterback, and this just in: Donovan McNabb is going to his fifth conference championship game, too.

McNabb and Reid are joined at the hip, with the head coach demonstrating unerring faith and confidence in his quarterback through a bumpy career. That faith was tested when Reid benched McNabb for the second half against Baltimore when the team trailed by a field goal.

Yet he returned to him the following week, as he should have, in a move that seems to have paid off for both, as well as the Eagles.

"Sometimes you take a little step back and a big step forward," said Reid. "That's all it was. (McNabb) wants to take the whole team and put them on his back, and more power to him. Now other guys around him are picking their games up and getting better."

That sounds so simple, yet McNabb seemed to fall into line behind his head coach. He talked about how much "looser" the club is now, and how he's having more "fun" than he did, say, when he was laboring through the tie in Cincinnati.

"I think after (that) game everyone was pressing too much, including myself," said McNabb. "I always thought we're much better when we're loose."

That's where Reid plays an important role. With the season in doubt, he reassured his players as he reassured his coaches that if they simply improve what they do best they would succeed -- just as they have succeeded in the past.

It sounds corny, but it works, and Reid has the record to prove it.

Which is why you can't measure Reid's contributions in only wins and losses. Sometimes, you have to consider the poise he maintains in the face of a combative and sometimes hostile environment. In essence, he keeps the Eagles pushing forward by refusing to panic, by making the necessary adjustments, then returning to what he and his team do best.

Sunday's game was a perfect example. With the Eagles ahead by two at halftime, Reid called on McNabb to make quicker throws to avoid the Giants' pressure. Though McNabb hadn't been sacked, he had been hurried into inaccurate throws. So Reid took steps to make them stop.

Result: McNabb completed 13 of 22 second-half throws for 149 yards, a touchdown and a decisive victory.

"I've always stayed the course," Reid said. "You know what you end up doing? You go back to your fundamentals, and you just do the basics. That's what we did a great job of. You take a step back, you analyze everything and you come back to what you know -- the fundamentals -- and you go after it and you get better at them.

"It's worked before, so you expect it to work again. I think it's what the guys trust that you're going to do in very tough times. In a game like [Sunday], we went back at halftime and said, 'Let's go back and give the quarterback his best stuff and the running backs their best stuff, and let's go.'"

It worked, with the Eagles piling up 179 second-half yards after they were held to 97 in the first two periods. Afterward, reporters wanted to know about the resurrection of McNabb and a Philadelphia defense that stuffed Eli Manning on six second-half possessions, including two fourth-and-shorts, and the chances of Philadelphia reaching its second Super Bowl in five seasons.

But the real star of this show was Reid, who is back where he belongs -- in a conference championship game six weeks after speculation centered on his chances to return as the team's head coach in 2009.

"Yeah," Reid said, "but you know what? While everybody might be looking at you crazy there are two who aren't. So I don't worry. I don't get into that."

Nope, he just gets into the playoffs and maybe we won't appreciate what Andy Reid does or how good he does it until he's gone.

"I hope not," said Lurie, "because [what he has done] is remarkable. Yet he's so humble, and all he wants to do is win next week in Arizona and take it from there. We know we haven't accomplished anything yet."

Andy Reid has. And it's time we noticed.