The Arizona Cardinals defeated the Philadelphia Eagles 35-31 on Sunday on the road. After they scored a game-tying touchdown to make the score 28-28 with 5:26 remaining in the fourth quarter, they attempted an onside kick that failed.
At the time, it was certainly something people questioned.
Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon explained postgame that it was a strategic move.
It wasn’t a case of just trying to catch the Eagles off guard. It was part of some game and clock management.
“The reason for that is you don’t want to get bled out,” Gannon told reporters after the game. “That team is too good. I trust the defense to get a stop right there and make them kick a field goal, which is what they did, but with five minutes left, what they’ve shown is they’re not going to give you the ball back.”
Gannon “wanted to make sure at all costs” that quarterback Kyler Murray had the ball with a chance to win it.
The strategy worked. They either recover the kick themselves and have five minutes to get a game-winning score, or they allow the Eagles to score quickly and get the ball back.
The defense did its job, holding the Eagles to a field goal. Murray and the offense did the rest.
With how the game had gone offensively, he trusted Murray to lead them to the winning score.
“Yeah, there’s no doubt because you know how you set up the game versus a really good team,” he explained. “You’ve got to trust what your eyes are seeing too. I just thought we kind of self-destructed a little bit in the first half but we moved it up and down the field and we kept moving it in the second half. So really trusted the offense. Wanted to make sure that our offense had a chance to tie or win the game there and that’s the reason for the decision.”
The Cardinals went 70 yards in seven plays in 2:01, getting a two-yard touchdown run from James Conner with 32 seconds left in the game.
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