Kelly Reflects On Monday Night Win
By Ed Benkin
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Chip Kelly had talked about how his team strives for perfection each week even if they can't achieve it. Despite coming close against Carolina, Kelly believes his team still has room for improvement.
It may be a tough argument for fans to agree with after the team's 45-21 victory, but Kelly believes his team can still improve in certain areas, particularly on the offensive end.
"I don't think we were very consistent overall," said Kelly. "We could has sustained some drives. We missed a couple of key conversions on short yardage situations. You ask the guys on the offensive side of the ball, they felt like they didn't play well and I believe we didn't play up to our potential on the offensive side of the ball."
While Kelly may have found mistakes with his offense, it was hard to find fault with an Eagles defense, which dominated throughout the game against Carolina. The Eagles forced two turnovers on Carolina's opening drive and finished with five takeaways in the victory.
"They did a good job," Kelly said. "Overall, I think our defense played really well. We can always nitpick and kind of correct those little things that I think we need to look at, but when you come out of a game with as many turnovers as we had and nine sacks, you've got to say that we played pretty well."
The Eagles were expected to attack Carolina with the ground game since the Panthers had struggled against the run all season. However, the Panthers shut down the Eagles' rushers early in the game, so Kelly had no concerns about letting Mark Sanchez throw the football.
"We didn't execute the way we needed to execute in the run game," said Kelly. "They did a better job in defeating our blocks than we did sustaining our blocks. If you do that, we have to be able to beat you throwing the ball, and I think we had the ability to beat them in that way. As long as we're moving the football, we're confident with what we can do offensively."
Sanchez was impressive in his first game as an Eagles' starter, as he threw for 332 yards and two touchdowns. Now, Sanchez and his teammates will prepare on a short week for a tough test in Green Bay on Sunday. The Packers are 6-3, and Quarterback Aaron Rodgers led his offense to a 55-point performance against the Bears last Sunday.
"He's playing at a pretty high level," Kelly said. "I think he's arguably playing in the tops of league right now, and there are some quarterbacks playing at a pretty high level. The last couple of weeks, he's just been on fire. It's going to be a big challenge for us."
The Eagles will resume workouts on Wednesday.
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