Eagles Soar Over Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX; Barkley Breaks Season Rushing Record

February 9, 2025 by CollegeFootballPoll.com Staff

The Philadelphia Eagles avenged their 38-35 loss to Kansas City in Super Bowl LVII with a 40-22 win on Sunday night in New Orleans in Super Bowl LIX. In the process, Saquon Barkley rushed for 57 yards and set a new single season NFL rushing record with 2,504 yards to top the previous mark of 2,476 that belonged to Terrell Davis of Denver in the 1987 season.

Jalen Hurts was the MVP of this game as he threw for 221 yards and 2 touchdowns with an early INT. He also ran for 72 and another score. But you could have given the MVP award to the Eagles' defense for bottling up Mahomes and Kansas City early and staking out a 24-0 lead while holding Andy Reid's team to just 23 total yards in the first half.

The win is the second all-time for the Eagles, and comes 7 years after the franchise's 41-33 win over New England to cap their 2017 season.

The next big NFL moment comes in Green Bay in late April where Cameron Ward (+130) is the top NFL Draft betting favorite. Following the game, the Chiefs and Eagles were tied with the best odds for Super Bowl LX.

Hurts' lone TD run was only from 1-yard out in the first quarter at the 6:15 mark. It expanded to 10-0 on a 48-yard Jake Elliott field goal with 8:38 to go in the half. Three plays and 1 minute, 35 seconds later, Cooper DeJean had a 38-yard pick-6 to win the touchdown lottery and make it 17-0.

Hurts' first touchdown pass came with just 1:35 left in the half on a 12-yard TD pass to A.J. Brown after another Mahomes pass was intercepted. Zack Baun did the honors at the KC 14 when the Chiefs had just taken possession after a Philly punt. 

Kansas City needed to come out of the tunnel strong, but had to punt after just 5 plays and the Eagles took 6:43 off the clock on a 12-play drive that resulted in a 27-0 advantage after another Jake Elliott field goal (29 yards).

Another 5-play KC drive ended on an incomplete 4th-and-4 pass from the Eagles' 46-yard line, leading to a quick-change, first down touchdown pass to DeVonta Smith and a 34-0 lead.

At this point, Kansas City was staring at the first Super Bowl shutout loss and the fifth-widest margin of defeat.

But the Chiefs finally dinged the scoreboard on a 90-yard drive that took just 5 plays and culminated in a 24-yard touchdown connection with speedster Xavier Worthy. He added a 50-yard score when Mahomes dropped a dime in the endzone with just 108 ticks left on the clock. Worthy would wind up with157 yards on 8 catches to lead all receivers.

In between, Elliott added two more field goals of 48 and 50 yards before Kansas City made it 40-14 on a 7-yard pass to DeAndre Hopkins.

Kansas City had almost no running game with just 49 yards total, 25 of which came from Mahomes.

Barkley was kept out of the endzone after scoring 5 in the previous two playoff games in run his total number of touchdowns to 18 for the season.