How Sean Desai’s Eagles defense made adjustments and shut out Rams in second half of the Week 5 win

After the Eagles opened Sunday’s game with a touchdown reception by tight end Dallas Goedert, the Los Angeles Rams responded with their own 14-play scoring drive.

The Rams seemingly moved the ball at will as they favored shifty wide receiver Cooper Kupp, who caught five passes on six targets on their first drive. For several moments, it appeared that the Eagles and Rams were headed to a shootout in Southern California.

But when the visitors retreated to the sideline, defensive coordinator Sean Desai huddled around his unit, tablet in hand, and barked out instructions to veterans and young players alike. For the rest of the game, the Rams would manage just one more scoring drive — and they were shut out by an Eagles defense in the second half that keyed a 23-14 win.

“We communicated well on the sideline — we anticipated some of the things they were doing in the first drive, and they hit us on a couple of third downs [when] we had some chances to get off the field,” Desai said. “But we kind of just regrouped, we settled in, and we detailed some of the things we wanted to do with techniques and calls. The players, they brought it to life … and they did an outstanding job. They stuck with it and they played really well.”

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The offense aided the defense by owning the time of possession: 37 minutes, 55 seconds to 22:05. The Rams managed just 17 first downs to the Eagles’ 28, and they were outgained in total yards 454 to 249. As a byproduct, many of the defensive players were able to stay fresh throughout the game, and the pass rush feasted in the second half. Rookie defensive tackle Jalen Carter and linebacker Haason Reddick led the team with five combined quarterback hits and four sacks (two each).

“We’ll take those games every week if we can,” Desai said. “We want to be the freshest team, and part of that’s our offense doing such a tremendous job of controlling the ball, moving the ball, controlling the clock, and moving the ball downfield. … It manages our rep counts and makes our substitutions and rotations [easier], manages all of that. We’ll take that in any game.”

After Kupp had the five catches on the opening drive, he managed just three additional receptions over the remainder of the game. Quarterback Matthew Stafford completed just 56.7% (21 of 37) of his throws for 222 yards with two touchdowns.

Overall, it was an impressive response from a defensive unit that hasn’t repeated the starting lineup since the beginning of the season because of injuries at all three levels.

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“We stuck with our calls and tweaked some of our techniques within the calls to help our guys with their matchups,” Desai said. “Obviously with Kupp, we knew [he was] going to be a prime target there. And even with some of our disguise stuff and our front structure stuff, [we were able to get] after the quarterback and show him some different presentations and get our coverages in places that we needed to get to.

“One of the big messages all those guys, including the coaches and all the vets at halftime: ‘Let’s just do our stuff, let’s play our techniques, let’s win the leverages that we’re asked to win.’ If you do that, you’ve got a chance, and that showed. Our guys really took ownership of that.”