Eagles stats: How the punting game, Jalen Carter’s dominance, and Jalen Hurts’ steadiness led to another win

The Eagles won their eighth consecutive game behind a defense that passes every test and a running game led by Saquon Barkley that wears its opponents down late in games.

The 24-19 win over the Ravens in Baltimore kept the Eagles three games ahead of Washington in the loss column at the top of the NFC East and just a game behind the Detroit Lions for the best record in the NFC.

Here are four numbers that help tell the story of Sunday’s win.

» READ MORE: After the Eagles’ defense and Saquon Barkley beat up Derrick Henry, Lamar Jackson and the Ravens, it’s Super Bowl or bust

There was a fourth-and-2 early in the second quarter, and you wondered whether Nick Sirianni would decide to be aggressive from his own 41-yard line. But the Eagles elected to punt, and Braden Mann rewarded the decision by pinning the Ravens at their 1-yard line with a 58-yard punt. The defense forced a punt from the end zone and set up the offense with good field position (Baltimore’s 49-yard line). The sequence led to the Eagles’ first points, but it also was part of a key advantage the Eagles had Sunday in the punting game.

Mann punted six times Sunday and five of them resulted in Baltimore getting the ball back inside its own 20-yard line. In addition to pinning Baltimore at the 1-yard line, Mann had another punt that was downed at the 5.

That component, the downing of the ball, was a point of emphasis by Sirianni after the game. Eagles returner Britain Covey fielded all four of the punts sent his way. The Ravens returned just two of Mann’s punts. Sirianni estimated that Covey saved the Eagles 14 yards of field position on one of the punts he fielded and about 26 yards on another. In a game that was tight into the fourth quarter, the field-position battle mattered.

» READ MORE: The Eagles’ defense is the best reason to believe they can win the Super Bowl

Jalen Carter keeps making it harder and harder to take him off the field. He nearly played the entire game again, two weeks after doing so vs. Washington. Carter played 71 of the 72 defensive snaps (98.6%), his lone break coming on the final defensive play of the game. Carter faced double teams on 25 of his 43 pass rushes, according to Next Gen Stats. He still made an impact. His sack of Lamar Jackson gave him 4½ for the season and was one of three tackles Carter made for losses.

Carter continues to wreck games in the middle of the defensive line and his presence is having a domino effect on the players around him. Fellow defensive tackle Milton Williams had a team-high five pressures on 26 pass rushes, according to Next Gen Stats.

Sirianni had some choice words for some recent descriptions of Jalen Hurts that characterized the quarterback as a “game manager.” “That’s bull—,” Sirianni said, before making sure to mention, as he usually does, that Hurts is “a winner.”

While the Eagles continued their run-first approach for much of Sunday’s game, Hurts was 11-for-19 through the air for 118 yards and a touchdown. He added 29 yards on nine rushes and another score, via the Tush Push.

Hurts has 20 touchdowns against two turnovers during his team’s eight-game winning streak. That’s a 17-game pace of more than 42 touchdowns compared to fewer than five turnovers. Barkley might be getting the “MVP” chants from Eagles fans on a weekly basis right now, but Hurts is making an argument for himself, too.

» READ MORE: Saquon Barkley and the Eagles’ offensive line met the challenge against the Ravens’ run defense

Maybe the game would have gone differently if one of the best kickers in NFL history kicked like one of the best kickers in NFL history. Alas, Justin Tucker missed two field-goal tries — from 47 and 53 yards — and an extra point.

Those missed kicks, according to Next Gen Stats, resulted in the Ravens losing 28.4% of win probability.

According to Next Gen Stats, Tucker’s attempts this season have resulted in 61.6% win probability lost, the seventh-highest win probability lost by a kicker across the league. From 2016 to 2023, the Ravens had gained 167.1% in win probability on Tucker’s kick attempts, more than four times the percentage of any other kicker.