Eagles 19, 49ers 42
NICK SIRIANNI: Fire away.
Q. Nick, fourth and two at the 33, down 15, two and a half left, what were you...
NICK SIRIANNI: In the third quarter? Yeah, yeah, to me there was a lot of football left to play in the third quarter.
What did you say, 32 yard line, 33, right?
Q. (Indiscernible.)
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, so I don't regret that decision. To me, with that much time where that ball is right there, yeah, I did what I felt like I needed to do in that particular time.
Q. What are your takeaways?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, we didn't coach good enough, didn't play good enough. Simple as that. And why do you not do that? Well, you got to give credit to them, too. That's a really good football team. You don't come out and play your best game against the guys that they have and the coaches that they have, it's going to look like that.
So we got to coach better. Got to play better. We got a lot to clean up.
Q. Was Jalen's health a factor in the fourth down decision?
NICK SIRIANNI: No, no. So...
Q. They do anything differently schematically after the first quarter?
NICK SIRIANNI: I mean, yeah, obviously they started running the ball a little bit better. I mean, that was six plays, so it's hard to say that they made a complete schematic change after -- because they went three and out, three and out.
Our defense did a nice job. To say that you know exactly what their game plan after four first and second down calls and two third down calls, I can't answer that question, you know what I'm saying? It's just too small of a sample size to say they did something completely different.
They started moving the ball and being able to run in play-action. And, again, hats off to them. They got a lot of good players and coaches.
Q. You haven't often been in a position where you're down this big late in the fourth quarter. What's the benefit of keeping the starters in?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, we were still down two possessions. There was some time. We had our timeouts still. You know, just trying to continue the game.
Q. I think you were down 23...
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, we're going to fight to the end.
Q. You're down at linebacker. Clearly went at the linebackers. Why were they able to perform and even just kind of (indiscernible) tackles?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, again, hats off -- that's a tough team to tackle. We take pride in our tackling. I think we've been pretty good this year. We're in the top 10 as far as missed tackle rate.
But, you know, we didn't do good enough job today. Again, that's us putting the guys in positions to be able to tackle and then also doing it. A little bit uncharacteristic day on our part as far as the tackling.
You saw that lead to some big plays, and part of that is, too, they broke tackles. So they played really well and we didn't play well enough and they coached really well and we didn't coach well enough.
At the end of the day that's what it is. It was a little uncharacteristic the missed tackles, but Deebo and McCaffrey and Kittle, those guys do a good job. Aiyuk, they do a good job of breaking tackles as well.
Q. Did you see a difference in Jalen when he came back in?
NICK SIRIANNI: I thought he was fine when he came back in and was running the show and operating fine. Went down, drove, got a touchdown. Then we just stalled out on the next drive.
They're playing soft or giving us the stuff underneath, so -- but I thought he operated fine when he came back in. Obviously we'll see how he's feeling and everything.
Q. What's your reaction to...
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, again, have to watch the tape, but started off good as an entire offense, and we just -- in the red zone, had some red zone woes right there that we've done much better job of.
Then it's just today they stopped us in the red zone; kind of got behind the sticks in on one of them and got into a third and really long on one.
You know, I'll have to watch the tape and see what happened there exactly, but that was tough on us to have -- start the game fast and only be up 6-0. Hats off to them. They did a good job in the red zone, and, again, we didn't coach it well enough or execute it well enough.
Q. Did you stop yourself in the red zone or did they stop you?
NICK SIRIANNI: Again, credit to them. That's a good football team. You know, we're always going to want to play better when one something like this happens and coach better.
But they did a good job. They got good players and they had a good scheme and they stopped us.
Q. (Regarding sideline sequence.) Was what was your reaction to that?
NICK SIRIANNI: What was my reaction to that? Yeah, just saying -- just knowing we had to move on and play the next play. You know, so that's all we were trying to do in that scenario, is move on, get the ball down inside the 12 yard line or something after the personal foul, and just regroup and get everybody going and play the next play.
Just like we do when we have a bad play, a good play, bad game, good game, we're going to have to pick ourselves up off the mat this week as well.
Q. (Regarding seeing them again.) (Indiscernible.) Is that representative of the two teams or just one weak thing where they just had...
NICK SIRIANNI: You know, they got after us good today. Again, a lot of credit to them. They're a really good football team. We didn't play our best game. They're really good -- you can't play that way against -- and coach that way against a really good team.
So we're going to take this one day at a time. I heard a lot of guys back and forth talking about play it again, it can happen again. There is so much football to be played between now and then. So many other good teams also.
So that can't be in our thought process. What's going to have to happen tomorrow is we're going to have to get the corrections of what we made mistakes on and then go through our process. Anybody we play, you know, in the NFC, we're going to make sure we go through our process to say what happened, and then kind of our game evaluation if we play them again, here are the things we need to do better; here are the things we may not have expected that they did; here are some things they did well that you can anticipate repeating.
We're going to go through that process, and if it happens, it happens, but we're focused on the next game.
Again, hats off to them.
Q. Nick, you're always kind of hyper-focused on one week at a time. There was a report about your messaging to the team from Jay about take it personally the way they talk. In hindsight do you think that was the way to go?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I'm fine with that. Really, what it was is kind of what I say to you guys all the time as far as, hey, there were some things said after last game. If -- if you want to use that as motivation, use it. If it distracts you, then don't.
But make no mistake about it, the biggest motivation you always have is to play for each other. Yeah, I'm not going to second guess -- I'll second guess everything that -- I'll rethink through everything that I do or don't do, but as far as the messaging goes right there, shoot, yeah, again, that's what we're going to do with a lot of things.
If it helps you it helps you; if it doesn't -- but play for each other. Same thing with all that. Try to play under control. Again, there has been times we've used some stuff like that that it's been good for us; today it wasn't.
Again, really good football team and well coached.
Q. Two related questions. With Jalen going out was that part of reason not to go for it on fourth and two?
NICK SIRIANNI: No, no.
Q. What was kind of the discussion about that? Also, how do you see your playcalling change when the defense is not as successful as the past couple weeks?
NICK SIRIANNI: As far as right there, again, with where the ball was, I thought there was a lot of football left to be played to be able to punt it back to them. You take everything into account.
It was just the decision I made right there, and sometimes my decisions in those areas are going to work; sometimes they're not.
This particular one it didn't work.
Q. You played a lot of snaps last week, particularly on defense. Do you think this fatigue was an issue in this game?
NICK SIRIANNI: No, no. Again, everyone at this time of year is going to be tired and all those different things. We won't use that as an excuse. I know we played a lot of snaps, but, yeah, again, didn't coach well enough and didn't play well enough today.
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