What happened to the Eagles running game? Saquon Barkley and his teammates are looking for answers.

TAMPA, Fla. — Six times during the second half Sunday, the Eagles handed the ball to Saquon Barkley on a first down. It was the method to last year’s madness. Putting games away was so simple. The Eagles turned normal four-minute offense into eight-minute choke-outs. They held the ball for the final 10 minutes, 29 seconds of their Week 15 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers last season.

That was then, this is now.

Those six second-half first-down Barkley runs Sunday amounted to minus-1 yard. The Eagles, after building a 24-6 halftime lead, scored just seven points in the second half thanks to a short field after a forced turnover. They completed zero passes. Their running game was almost nonexistent, and because they couldn’t sustain drives, they opened the door for Baker Mayfield’s late-game magic before a defensive stand saved the Eagles from disaster.

Barkley rushed 19 times for 43 yards. Take away his longest run of the game, a 10-yard second-down run in the fourth quarter during what was a three-and-out series, and his per-carry average drops from 2.3 yards to 1.8. Barkley has 237 rushing yards through four games, a per-game average of 59.3. Sunday marked the second consecutive game Barkley was held under 50 yards. He had just one such contest last season.

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“The beauty of it,” Barkley said in the visitors locker room at Raymond James Stadium Sunday, “is we’re not running the ball too great and we’re 4-0.”

That was the overwhelming sentiment after the Eagles escaped with a 31-25 victory. It is hard to win in the NFL, and the Eagles were happy to be flying home from soupy Tampa as the only 4-0 team in the NFC. But there was also an awareness that there’s a lot to clean up, especially with the running game.

News flash: Barkley isn’t going to run for 2,000 yards again. The Bucs were like every Eagles opponent so far this season, especially in the second half, stacking the box to take Barkley out of the game.

“That’s what happens when you have the year that we had last year and you got a year of tape,” Barkley said. “We got to do a better job of adjusting to that and having answers to that, and I got to do a better job. The running game always starts with me. I’m a big believer in that. When the running game is going bad, I got to own it. I just got to be better.”

The Eagles also need to be able to make adjustments, and at times when the running game hasn’t worked they’ve seemed to be too predictable with when and how they run.

“I think we have to do a better job up front of executing,” Jordan Mailata said. “But also if we know they’re going to load the box, let’s kind of see how we can pick them apart, whether we run more play actions [passes]. But I think it starts with us up front and the execution.”

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The Eagles’ front line has been banged up. Lane Johnson left the game with a shoulder injury and hasn’t finished either of the last two games. Landon Dickerson is playing through pain. Tyler Steen left the game in the first half only to return in the second half with a brace on his left knee. Johnson’s status is not known. He declined interviews in the locker room after the game.

Mailata took the blame for his own missed assignment on the first play of the second half, a 3-yard Barkley loss. He also credited the Bucs for making adjustments and was critical of the Eagles’ operation and sense of urgency in the second half.

Sunday’s second half continued a trend. The Eagles have too often found themselves in second-and-long situations.

“I’m not trying to search for the big one,” Barkley said. “I got to do a better job of just getting into a flow and getting into the rhythm of the game. Right now I’m not doing a great enough job on first downs, trying to keep us in manageable second downs.”

What can he change?

“Just get more yards,” he said. “If it’s a zero-yard gain, make it to a 3-yard gain. If it’s a 3-yard gain, make it to a 6-yard gain. I just got to do a better job of that.”

His backup, AJ Dillon, said he thought Barkley has done a good job making plays without the ball in his hands. But Dillon cautioned opposing teams stacking the box that they’d be in the “pick your poison” situation Barkley has referred to in the past. The Eagles, Dillon said, have A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith.

True, but the dynamic duo combined for four catches for 36 yards Sunday, and while the Eagles have showed flashes of brilliance offensively, the larger portion of the small, total sample shows an offense that has slogged its way to 4-0 while not being able to run efficiently.

“Their ability to have the year that they did rushing, you’re going to get attention on those obvious run downs,” Dillon said. “I know it’s the natural tendency, human nature, [to say], ‘We did this so well last year, what’s going on?’ from the outside.”

Dillon expects improvement.

“I’ve obviously never been part of a Super Bowl team, but you don’t get there by being complacent,” he said. “Yeah, 4-0 is great, you have to enjoy it for sure. But I think the thing that separates a good team from the great teams is their ability to be critical of themselves without taking offense.”

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Which offense is the Eagles? The one from the second half Sunday and first half last week? Or the one from the first half Sunday and second half last week?

“I think we’re both,” Barkley said. “When we’re firing, we’re really hard to stop. But when we’re playing bad, we’re really playing bad.”

They were bad for the final 30 minutes Sunday, and they’ve been bad when trying to force-feed last year’s NFL rushing champion. Yet, they got through arguably the toughest four-game stretch on their schedule unscathed.

“I like winning football games and I don’t care what it looks like,” Barkley said. “Whether it’s me rushing for 20 yards or rushing for 200 yards. Whatever it takes. I don’t care if the score is 6-3 or 36-4. We’re 4-0. But, again, the way we played in the second half this week and the first half last week, especially on offense, we’re going to have a hard time winning football games.”

Playing like this, running like this, and winning like this probably isn’t sustainable. But the Eagles have yet to prove otherwise.

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