The Eagles paid a painful price for their lack of discipline vs. Washington. Will they learn their lesson?

LANDOVER, Md. — After getting disqualified for his second unsportsmanlike conduct penalty of the afternoon, an agitated C.J. Gardner-Johnson flipped the Northwest Stadium crowd the double bird as he walked up the tunnel on his way back to the locker room.

Then, over the course of the next 26½ minutes, the Washington Commanders flipped the score against the Birds.

Gardner-Johnson’s ejection underscored an undisciplined day for the Eagles defense in a 36-33 loss to their divisional foe. The loss snapped the Birds’ 10-game win streak and pushed the top seed in the NFC further out of their reach. Even though the Eagles forced five turnovers, including a Gardner-Johnson interception, the Commanders turned their opponent’s missteps and mistakes into points in a come-from-behind win.

“If you ask me, we went a little bit too far over the line,” linebacker Nakobe Dean said of the Eagles’ role in the chippy nature of the game. “As soon as we started getting penalties through it, started affecting drives and things like that.”

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Tensions began to simmer late in the first quarter when Gardner-Johnson incurred his first unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. During the television timeout ahead of the second quarter, Gardner-Johnson, Jalen Carter, and other members of the Eagles defense engaged in a back-and-forth with Jayden Daniels, Terry McLaurin, and others from the Commanders offense.

While it appeared that some shoving ensued between both sides, Gardner-Johnson was the only player who was flagged, giving the Commanders an extra 15 yards of field position and a new set of downs. They didn’t capitalize on that drive, but the temperature of the game continued to rise. Carter was later called for unnecessary roughness after he shoved Commanders right guard Sam Cosmi to the ground, marking his fourth such penalty of the season and his second in as many weeks.

“I guess they said that it was a very intense game, so they just decided to call that,” Carter said. “I can’t do nothing. I can’t reverse time or nothing. Just got to go on to the next play.”

Still, the Eagles maintained a 24-14 lead early in the third quarter, even with Jalen Hurts out due to a concussion and penalties mounting. But the missteps persisted. Gardner-Johnson was ejected after his second unsportsmanlike infraction of the game early in the third quarter, which came in the aftermath of a Zack Baun forced fumble that was recovered by Nolan Smith.

After the game, referee Shawn Smith said via the pool reporter that Gardner-Johnson was “basically taunting the opponent” on the second foul, leading to his disqualification.

The veteran safety was not available for comment in the locker room. However, in a post to X, Gardner-Johnson wrote, “Respectfully got kicked out for nothing, I play with passion and fire!! Guys was chirping all day what u expect !!”

Nick Sirianni declined to disclose the details of his conversation with the officials regarding the reasoning behind Gardner-Johnson’s second unsportsmanlike conduct call. One week after his animated discussion with Carter about his unnecessary roughness penalty in the Pittsburgh Steelers game, the Eagles coach said he would continue to have discussions with his players about lapses in discipline.

“We talk about everything,” Sirianni said. “We’ll talk about it again tomorrow. We talked about it on the field right there as it happened. Again, if it didn’t get fixed, though, that’s always going to be on me. They’ve got to be better in those scenarios. And I’ve got to be better in those scenarios to help them. Again, we look at this as an opportunity to get better from, because we know we need to get better from the things that we messed up today.”

Tristin McCollum, a 25-year-old depth safety, entered in relief of Gardner-Johnson following his ejection. The Commanders’ comeback began at his expense early in the fourth quarter. Former Eagles receiver Olamide Zaccheaus found a soft spot in the Eagles’ coverage in the back corner of the end zone and hauled in a 4-yard touchdown pass with McCollum in his wake to pull the Commanders within six points.

After the game, McCollum acknowledged that he should have bumped over in their zone coverage to pick up the out-breaking Zaccheaus.

“I should be able to collect that in my lap,” McCollum said. “Just a miscue on the secondary, part miscue on my part. Just got to take that accountable and just get back on the practice field.”

Zaccheaus wasn’t finished. On the next Commanders possession, the Eagles made another blunder when Darius Slay mistakenly came on the field as a 12th defender. Slay had been sidelined briefly and he tried to re-enter the game, but Kelee Ringo had already taken his spot as the second outside cornerback opposite Quinyon Mitchell.

The infraction earned the Commanders a free play and a chance to exploit a busted coverage. Zaccheaus took off down the right sideline uncovered and clamored for the ball. Once Daniels connected with him, he shed an attempted tackle from the backtracking Ringo, then broke a second from Reed Blankenship before waltzing into the end zone. His 49-yard touchdown reception, which included 31 yards after the catch, allowed the Commanders to take a 28-27 lead.

Slay took accountability for the 12 men on the field penalty after the game and the confusion that ensued.

“I was running out there because I was ready to go back in,” Slay said. “I probably should have let my DB coach know. I let my other DB coach know that I was ready to go. I should have let my DB coach know.”

After the Eagles settled for a field goal before the two-minute warning, following a key dropped pass by DeVonta Smith, to go up 33-28, the team turned to its defense to make a stand. It fell short, conceding a nine-play, 57-yard drive that ended with a Jamison Crowder 9-yard touchdown reception to pull off their comeback victory.

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Baun initially picked up the receiver off the line of scrimmage beneath the two-high safety look, but the inside linebacker seemingly lost Crowder when the receiver bent his route toward the middle of the end zone. Still, Blankenship took accountability for the breakdown after the game.

“I’ve got to get them in the right call and see it a little bit faster,” Blankenship said. “Not putting it on anybody else but me. I control the back end and if anybody wants to point fingers, point fingers at me.”

Between their undisciplined penalties and their untimely breakdowns, the Eagles defense came up short in the team’s first loss since September. Poor situational defense was an uncharacteristic issue. Despite the Eagles’ defense ranking No. 2 in the league in third-down percentage and No. 4 in red-zone percentage entering the game, the Commanders went 7-for-13 on third down (53.8%) and 3-for-4 (75%) in the red zone.

The Commanders also rattled off three explosive passing plays and an explosive Daniels run against an Eagles defense that had excelled at limiting them for the majority of the season.

Explosive tempers didn’t do them any favors, either.

“We know we got to play better,” Dean said. “We got to do better. We was doing a lot of uncharacteristic things as far as penalties and certain things that was going on out there.

“But we’re going to use this to build on it. It’s time to practice what we preach now, as far as continuing to get better. The way we handle adversity. This is adversity.”