The guts of Donovan McNabb playing through his injuries and David Akers kicked the game-winning FG basically on one leg with only 9 seconds left to lift the Eagles to a 23-20 win over the Raiders. The game however started out as a complete ‘Special Teams’ debacle. Akers re-injured his right hamstring as he fell to the turf in pain on the opening kickoff. This resulted in the Eagles also going offsides. On the second kickoff attempt, Akers once again fell and the result was again another offsides. Third try; long snapper Mike Bartrum kicked off and promptly kicked the ball out-of-bounds, resulting in another penalty. Oakland took the ball at mid-field. First play from the line of scrimmage resulted in another Eagles penalty; offsides on the defense. Four plays, four penalties. Then four plays later, Kerry Collins hit LaMont Jordan for a TD from 8-yards out. Not a very good start for Philadelphia. Oakland would take a 10-6 lead at halftime thanks mainly to great position(s). It could have been worse, but the Eagles defense played well after the opening TD drive and held Oakland to 130 yards in the first half.

On the other hand, the Eagles first five possessions ended in 4 punts and 1 INT. McNabb’s lone interception came after the Eagles drove down the field 62 yards to the Raiders 17-yard line. It was a pass intended for TE LJ Smith, which was tipped at the line of scrimmage right into the arms of Warren Sapp. McNabb did engineer another nice drive late in the second quarter. It started with great field position after the Eagles defense held Oakland to 3-and-out inside the Raiders own 5-yard line. After a defensive holding penalty, it was Westbrook off right tackle for 10 yards down to the 34-yard line. McNabb then completed a pass to Greg Lewis for 12 more yards on third down. Finally, a running play to Brian Westbrook off left tackle found the end zone from 18 yards out. Mark Simoneau attempted another extra point, but it was blocked. Oakland would add a late FG with just 42 seconds left in the second quarter to take a 10-6 lead into locker room.

The Eagle offense came to life in the third quarter. Philadelphia drove the field on an 11-play 71-yard drive, which ended with a touchdown to start the third quarter. David Akers came back to kick the extra point to give the Eagles a 13-10 lead. He hobbled off the field and Bartrum had to kick off again. Late in the third quarter, McNabb drove the team again from their own 10-yard line in just 7 plays to extend the lead to 20-10. The first play of this drive was another big gain on the ground for Brian Westbrook. He ran for 13 yards. Two plays later, Westbrook caught a medium pass along the right sidelines and ran it for a huge gain of 62 yards down to the Raiders 19-yard line. Three plays later, Westbrook struck again on a short 5-yard shuffle pass straight up the middle for the touchdown. Westbrook was unstoppable finishing the day with a combined 208 yards (140 receiving yards on 6 catches and 68 rushing yards on 13 carries).

The two heroes of the day were truly Donovan McNabb and David Akers. The Eagles would not have won this game without them. McNabb finished the day throwing for 365 yards, while completing 30-for-52 passes. In the second half alone, he was 19-for-28 with 266 yards and 2 TD’s. He also had a QB rating of 122. This was after a tough start in the first half when he only threw for 99 yards and had a rating of 40.1. David Akers was even more inspiring kicking 2 extra points and a FG on only one leg. The FG was the game winner with just 23 seconds left in the game. But in the same point, if not for Westbrook and Terrell Owens, these two warriors would not have had a chance to pull out this victory. The Eagles deserved this game as they dominated the Raiders throughout much of the second half. And if not for a fourth quarter fumble by LJ Smith, this game would never have come down to the Akers FG with just 23 seconds left. The Eagles won and Oakland is now 0-3.