Super Bowl highlights: The 6 biggest moments from the Eagles’ win over the Chiefs

There was a time when most Super Bowls were like this.

I remember when the 49ers and Cowboys routinely blew out lesser opponents on the game’s biggest stage, when the Broncos and Bills lost huge seemingly every season. The Bears killed the Patriots, the Ravens smothered the Giants, the Giants and Washington football team battered Denver, and so on, and so on, and so on.

It was a rarity to have a Super Bowl played down to the wire, but in the age of NFL free agency, most Super Bowls have been relatively close, if not downright thrilling.

Last night, your Philadelphia Eagles authored a throw-back beatdown that was as impressive as anything we watched Dallas, San Francisco, Pittsburgh or anyone else author on the NFL’s biggest stage. Somehow, the 40-22 score didn’t come close to indicating just how thoroughly the Eagles dominated the best quarterback and best head coach in football and how completely they decimated an honest-to-goodness dynasty.

For fans who, like me, cut their teeth on the Buddy Ryan era of Eagles football, this seven-year run is beyond our wildest dreams. Never could we have imagined the Birds playing in three Super Bowls in seven years and winning two of them, nor could we have imagined them beating perhaps the two greatest QBs ever to play — Tom Brady and Mahomes — as well as perhaps the two greatest coaches to wear the headsets — Bill Belichick and Big Red, to win them.

Think about the three straight first-round playoff losses by Buddy’s Gang Green, the Rich Kotite and Ray Rhodes squads that won a playoff game each but never sniffed the Super Bowl. The Andy Reid era in Philly, littered with success, frustrations and, ultimately, a three-point loss to Brady’s Patriots after the 2004 season. For decades before that, the Eagles were an afterthought, the little brothers of the league constantly punching up at Dallas, San Francisco, New York, Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Mostly bad, sometimes good, never quite good enough. Hopelessness abounded.

No more. Now, the Eagles are the team everyone in the NFC and, for the moment, the NFL, is looking up to.

Even if you felt as I did that the Eagles would win this game somewhat comfortably, no one could have predicted they’d be up 34-0 in the 3rd quarter or 40-6 with three minutes left as Kansas City’s ill-fated three-peat landed with a resounding thud. The game was like a giant snowball gathering steam as it rushed down the side of a mountain, ultimately crashing at the bottom in a glorious display of green confetti’d destruction on the Super Dome turf.

There were multiple mileposts along the way to Sunday night’s victory, but here are the six most pivotal moments that paved the way to the Birds’ second Super Bowl title.

A.J. Brown’s 4th Down “Catch”

Why am I starting with a play that didn’t even count over, say, Jahan Dotson’s reception that set up the Eagles’ first touchdown? Even though the refs’ early attempts to swing the game in Kansas City’s direction failed, Brown’s near-catch showed the Eagles were not going to play passively. They were going to be aggressive. Nick Sirianni, Kellen Moore and the offense were determined to learn from mistakes made in Super Bowl 57 and keep the pedal down.

It also proved how dialed in Jalen Hurts and A.J. Brown were right from the start. It was a beautifully thrown ball and a gracefully executed catch that should have stood and given the Eagles points on their first drive.

In the end, this play mostly served as an indication these Eagles were primed and ready to take it to the two-time defending champs.

Back-to-Back Sacks
Through their first three drives, Vic Fangio’s defense had done a wonderful job locking down Mahomes’ receiving corps and, in particular, Travis Kelce, forcing two 4-and-outs and one 3-and-out. But it wasn’t until about 8 minutes left in the first half that the front-four really began to eat. And when they did, the avalanche came quickly.

Of all the units on the defense in 2024, the defensive line was not the strongest. They only tallied 41 sacks, tied for 13th-most in the NFL, but in their four postseason games, they put up 16 sacks, 39% of their season total. As Jalen Carter began to draw more double teams, Milton Williams, Josh Sweat and Nolan Smith found their footing. Over the last two months of the season, that group found another gear.

Last night, everyone got in on the act. Jalyx Hunt, Brandon Graham, and Jordan Davis joined the four linemen mentioned above and made Mahomes look like a jittery Daniel Jones in the pocket. It was breathtaking and ultimately led to the next two moments that essentially sealed the game.

Cooper DeJean’s INT
To this point, the Eagles held a 10-0 lead, but it didn’t feel safe. We’ve seen Mahomes get off to slow starts before and rally his team by clicking on another gear. While the Eagles’ offense had moved the ball well to that point, they’d only put up 10 points on the scoreboard. There was a palpable fear they were letting Mahomes and the Chiefs hang in the game too long.

That was until Cooper DeJean entered the chat.

What a sequence. The Eagles got back-to-back sacks and then forced Mahomes into a killer pick-six that I believe was the turning point of Super Bowl 59. All of a sudden, after letting Kansas City hang around, seven more points were on the board, and the decidedly pro-Eagles crowd was roaring.

While the game wasn’t over, this was the moment it truly felt like Super Bowl 59 would not go down the same way Super Bowl 57 did.

Zack Baun’s INT
The Eagles have a 17-0 lead. They have all the momentum. Things are starting to feel really good. But now Mahomes has the ball with two minutes left and a chance to at least get his team on the board heading into halftime. KC won the toss and would receive the second half kickoff. Here was a chance for them to get some of that momentum back and chip away at their deficit and plant a seed of doubt in Philadelphia’s heads.

But pressure once again and a poor Mahomes decision led to the turnover that would ultimately seal the Chiefs’ fate.

Zack Baun made one of the more athletic interceptions you’re likely to see from a linebacker, snagging Mahomes’ worm-killer before it hit the turf. It set the offense up in prime field position for A.J. Brown’s 12-yard touchdown that pushed the score to 24-0 at halftime.

No matter how heroic Patrick Mahomes had been throughout his illustrious career, it became difficult, if not impossible, to imagine the Eagles blowing this game.

Maddox 4th Down Stop
Next came the daggers.

After a field goal made it 27-0, Kansas City had one last gasp, although at this point, there really was no way for them to make up the kind of ground they’d need to overcome the Eagles.

Facing a 4th-and-5 from the Eagles’ 46, the Chiefs had no choice but to go for it. This time, little-used veteran Avonte Maddox stepped in and all but iced the game with this huge pass break-up.

DeVonta TD “The Dagger”
What followed was perhaps the splashiest play of the game, and the one that may end up being the favorite for many Eagles fans years from now — Hurts’ 46-yard bomb to DeVonta Smith that plunged the dagger into KC’s hearts and their dreams of a three-peat.

It may have been the most beautifully-thrown ball of Jalen Hurts’ career, and Smith did what he always does in big games — come up with the huge play. Just when you thought the Eagles were going to try to bleed clock and run Saquon Barkley, Sirianni, Moore, Hurts and Smith dialed up the kill shot, and executed it to perfection.

Obviously, there were many other moments along the way. DeAndre Hopkins’ drop that stalled a drive just before halftime after the Brown touchdown, Saquon’s catch down to the 4, Hurts’ many scrambles for first downs, Milton Williams’ strip-sack, the personal foul penalty against the Chiefs on Barkley, all of them had big-time impacts.

But the six plays above were the most prominent mileposts in a victory none of us will ever forget.