Three quick thoughts on the Eagles versus the Giants in the NFC divisional playoffs

This is how they should have hoped for it to play out, right?

No Bucs defense. No Cowboys offense. Seattle would have been great, but the Giants were the ideal reality most within reach.

Now, that reality is here, and the only thing standing between the Eagles and the NFC Championship Game is a team that they have already defeated twice this season. Be careful what you wish for? Maybe. But divisional-round matchups don’t get much more favorable than this.

The Giants’ 31-24 upset victory over Minnesota on Sunday afternoon in the second of three NFC wild-card games gave the Eagles the clarity they were looking for. By knocking off the third-seeded Vikings, the sixth-seeded Giants ensured that they will enter next weekend as the NFC’s lowest-seeded team, thereby earning themselves a second trip to Lincoln Financial Field in three weeks.

Saturday’s showdown will be the two teams’ fifth all-time postseason game and the third since 2000, but their first since 2008, when the Eagles’ 23-11 victory in the divisional round set up their NFC championship game loss to the Cardinals.

» READ MORE: Eagles will face familiar foe in playoffs after Giants upset the Vikings

Suddenly, the story lines are locked in:

New York coach Brian Daboll turned Jones loose against Minnesota and gave Eagles defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon plenty to think about. The Giants’ fourth-year quarterback was magnificent against the Vikings, completing 24 of 35 passes for 301 yards and two touchdowns while adding another 78 yards on 17 carries. While Jones has had plenty of success this season, rarely have we seen him command a football field the way he did on Sunday.

» READ MORE: Eagles open up as a sizable favorite for playoff opener vs. Giants

In the Giants’ 48-22 loss to the Eagles in mid-December, he threw for just 169 yards on 18 of 27 passing. Last November, he was 19 of 30 for 202 yards and a touchdown in New York’s 13-7 win. Daboll has looked increasingly comfortable putting the game in his young quarterback’s hands. We’ll see if that continues against a much tougher Eagles defense.

Think about how drastically the complexion of the NFC East has changed this season. It was only two years ago when the 4-11-1 Eagles cost their division rivals a wholly undeserved playoff spot by tanking the final game of the season. Since then, both have changed coaches and embarked on what was expected to be a period of rebuilding and quarterback uncertainty. Now, suddenly, the NFC East could potentially have three of the final four teams standing in the NFC playoffs, with the winner of Monday night’s Dallas-Tampa Bay game set to face the second-seeded 49ers next weekend.

The Giants and the Eagles, in particular, are a testament to the importance of quality coaching. Daboll has worked wonders with a Giants team whose personnel is largely unchanged since the disastrous Joe Judge era. Likewise, Nick Sirianni has turned the Eagles into one of the most fundamentally sound teams in the NFL. The strength of each coach is his understanding of the talent he has at his disposal and his ability to put that talent in the best possible situations. We saw that on Sunday with Jones’ scrambling ability. The Eagles have a clear edge in talent on both sides of the ball, but the chess match between Daboll and Sirianni will be one to watch.

If Jalen Hurts and Lane Johnson are both the players that they have been for the majority of the season, it’s hard to imagine anybody stopping this Eagles team, let alone the Giants. In a Week 18 victory over a Giants team that was playing its backups, Hurts looked like a quarterback who knew that he could win a game while still protecting his injured shoulder. The Eagles offense struggled enough to make you realize how much Hurts’ rushing ability means. Anybody who has watched Hurts’ competitiveness over the last couple of seasons should have little doubt that he’ll look much closer to the player who was and still deserves to be the NFL MVP frontrunner.

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Just as big of a wild card is Johnson, who missed the last two games of the regular season with a core muscle injury. The Eagles have historically struggled with their star right tackle on the sidelines, and nothing that we saw against the Saints or the Giants suggests that those struggles will suddenly disappear in the postseason. Johnson returned to practice last week and is as tough as they come. Expect him to be out there Saturday looking like his usual self.

Is the world ready for the Giants and Eagles in the playoffs? If not, it had better get there quick.