Q. Hey, Coach, thanks for taking the time today.
NICK SIRIANNI: Thanks, Shane.
MODERATOR: We'll start with Jeff and then we'll go to Chris.
Q. Hey, in this case, I know you wanted to get Dallas some reps there in the last game, but what does he bring to the run game when I know the you get him back?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, physical blocker. Does the things you need your tight end to do, being able to hold the point, you know, on the front side. Very athletic on the backside. Just able to do a lot of different things and be multiple -- you can be multiple in your schemes with him in there, and that's what makes Dallas. Obviously Dallas is a big play-maker when the ball's in his hands. We saw that with the return of him yesterday but what makes him a complete tight end is his ability to block and all the different schemes that he can do, so that's big to get him back for both the run and the pass game.
MODERATOR: We'll go to Chris and then Brooks.
Q. Afternoon, Nick. All the guys in the locker room said they saw the Packers are a different team than they were last -- towards the end of the season as opposed to early in the season. As you guys are developing this game plan, what do you see that's different from the Packers?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, it's still obviously early on in our stages of scouting them but teams develop and teams from game one to game where we are now, 18, everyone's a different team. Some teams have different players because of injuries. You know, schemes you start to get used to what you're good at, what you're not good at, so everybody is in a different mode than they were, you know, week one. Now, obviously, there's things that are staples that are good for -- that have been good for them, that have been good for us that remain the same, but there's a lot of changes and a lot of differences. I just see a really -- at the end of the day, though, I see a really well-coached, fundamentally sound football team and with a lot of really good football players, a lot of really good solid football players on that roster. It's a really good football team that we're playing here on Sunday.
MODERATOR: We'll go to Brooks and then Dave.
Q. Kind of following up about that, they were the first to see your offense with Saquon. How much do you feel like they know who you are, you know, and how much do you think towards Saquon that they're prepared for on the second go-around?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, again. The team's different from now from when we played week one until now. A lot of things have changed. A lot of things, you know, both teams. So I can't answer what they think there or how they think there. I know they'll be paying attention to Saquon like everybody else that we play pays attention to him, so, again, got a lot of respect for how they've coached their defense. A lot of good -- again, a lot of good guys out there. Number 92 is an outstanding player. 93. They got players -- number 7. They got players at every level. 25's a play maker. Xavier McKinney, obviously we know him well. Big-time play-maker who can take the football away who's done a good job of that against us, and so he -- they got some special guys on that and I think they're really well-coached.
MODERATOR: We'll go to Dave and then Martin.
Q. Hey, Nick, with the way Tanner's played the last couple of weeks and with Kenny's injury, any thought to making Tanner the back-up as you enter the playoffs?
NICK SIRIANNI: I've got a lot of confidence in both the guys. When Kenny's had to play, he's played really well. When Tanner's had to play, he's played really well. So we got a really good room. Obviously, Jalen has had an outstanding season, so we just have a great room. Credit to Howie and his staff of getting these guys in here and just a great job by these guys and taking advantage of their opportunities and great job by Kellan, Kevin, Doug, helping these guys develop so we feel really, really good about the room of where we are.
MODERATOR: Martin and then John.
Q. Hey, Nick. A little bit along those lines. Obviously you played a lot of back-ups, reserves and everything yesterday. Did any of them stand out? And in particular, a guy like Jahan Dotson, third wide receiver this year hasn't really gotten a lot of targets, does a game like this help him going into the playoffs?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I think any time you build on your performances, really we pride ourselves in that we're going to get better from any performance we have, you know? Win, lose, play good, play bad, but, yeah, any time you go out and play a solid game and play well, it's going to give you some confidence to move on to the next one and so Jahan played really good, really played a really good game, was good in and out of the breaks, caught the ball really clean. Had some moments with the ball in his hands on yards after the catch. One thing we've really enjoyed about Jahan is he came in here and just fit right in with the rest of the guys playing tough and physical. He's scrappy out there and he's been scrappy since the day he got here. Even when he's not touching the football, he's affecting the game so good to see him get his hands on the ball yesterday and do the things he did yesterday. That was exciting to see, and I know we're going to need him to make plays throughout the post-season and this will be a big game for all of us this weekend.
MODERATOR: We'll go to John and then Ruban.
Q. Afternoon, Nick. Now that you're past week 18, a lot of people say, hey, treat it like a pre-season game but you don't have 90 guys. Some got to rest, some had to dress, some got to play. Now that you're past it, how do you think your guys handled that? Especially the ones who did play?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I think they took advantage to play to get better. You couldn't rest obviously. Like you said, you don't have 90 guys on the team to do that. I thought Jordan Davis went out and played one of his best games here as an Eagle. He was outstanding. I think there was a lot of guys that had really outstanding -- like Oren Burks had 17 tackles. That's incredible. Sydney made a huge play that sealed the game. Isaiah had a huge return. All those different things. We got a lot of contributions from a lot of different -- I thought the offensive line played great. All those guys across the O-line, Jack Driscoll, DK had some really good performances and we know Tanner played a really solid game so you got a lot of performances from a lot of different guys and as you see, the guys I named are a lot of different -- some are back-ups, some are rotational players, some are starters so it took everybody's contribution and everybody put everything they had to get ourselves that win and to play to our standard of how we want to play football. So Williams played really good. Just a lot of different guys that have different roles on this football team that went out and busted their butts. I think that says a lot about our guys.
MODERATOR: Ruban and then Zack.
Q. Hey, Nick. I was wondering if you could kind of outline some of the things Vic was able to do this year to turn the defense around with a lot of new pieces, a lot of guys who hadn't played before, rookies, guys in new positions and it all came together pretty quickly.
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I think Vic works his butt off and is constantly trying to find ways way to help his defensive scheme get better and I think he does such a good job of holding everybody accountable to how he wants it to look. He's got a great vision of how he wants it to look and how he sees it. He holds people accountable to that and I think he calls a great game. I think he's got so much experience calling games, just got great feel for it. I love that we talk about scheme but then Vic is so obsessed too, with the fundamentals of how you tackle, how you get off blocks. I love his tackling meeting on Saturday nights where he's going over all the different ways that these guys run the football, how we're going to have to tackle the things that can present problems and go through all that detail there. Just a ton of experience and great, detailed coach has had a lot of success in this league and obviously we've had a lot of success this year and he's just done a great job of coaching these guys, coaching the coaches on our staff and coaching the guys, and it's been a great group effort on that defensive side of the football.
MODERATOR: We'll go to Zack and then Bo.
Q. Good afternoon, Nick. I'll ask the challenging question today. As you put the game plan together, is it with the intention of Jalen going as the starting quarterback this weekend?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, I have no new information for you guys. Like I said yesterday, he progressing through protocol.
Q. Are you able to say if he's in the building today?
NICK SIRIANNI: I got no new info for you guys here today. I'm sorry.
MODERATOR: We have time for two more. Bo and then Olivia.
Q. Hey, Nick, I'm just curious why you went to Braden on kickoffs yesterday after Jake the week prior?
NICK SIRIANNI: Yeah, every situation calls for something different. You know, and as you saw, Jake kicked off a couple as well and so there's a lot of different factors that go into it. Haven't decided who is doing it in the playoffs against Green Bay. We'll see and everything will be accounted for. I think at the end of the day, though, we have two guys that we feel are very capable. Obviously, don't ever want a penalty. I believe that was our only penalty of the day yesterday. I was kind of hoping we didn't have any penalties yesterday, but a lot of confidence if both guys, but we can't make that mistake of kicking it out of bounds there.
MODERATOR: We'll end with Olivia here.
Q. Hey, Nick, this is, of course, your fourth trip to the post-season with the Eagles as head coach. I'm curious what, if anything, did you learn from your other three trips that you'll use to inform the way that you approach this upcoming post-season trip, whether it's for things that you like that you did in the past or things that maybe you learned from that you didn't like as much.
NICK SIRIANNI: Sure, I think after every situation you go through you make notes and you try to go through what you did well and what you didn't do well. I think at the end of the day, the higher the stakes get, as we get into single elimination football, the more you got to stay committed to the things you've done on a daily basis to get 14 wins. I think that's been my biggest thing. All right, what can you do different here now and it's not even different and it always comes back to -- and it always comes back to what got you here, right? What got you here? What got you 14 wins? That doesn't mean you're not looking to improve on the things you can do better at, which is exactly what we're doing trying to shore up everything that we can, but what are the core things that got you to this situation? And when everybody is talking about single elimination football, what happens to this? Well, what happens in three weeks if you do this and boom, boom, boom, we stay committed to completely what we're doing. It's what we have been doing all year and that's the point, right? What's gotten you to the number two seed in the NFC with the NFC East title? Stick to those principles. Tough, detailed together and really double, triple, quadruple down on these things.
MODERATOR: Thanks for the time, Coach.
NICK SIRIANNI: Thanks, everybody.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports