LANDOVER — During the third quarter of the Washington Redskins’ 47-14 win against the New Orleans Saints, running back Matt Jones hardly believed what he was seeing.
A crumpled wad of cash blew by on the FedEx Field grass and Jones pointed it out to Redskins wide receiver Pierre Garcon. Garcon picked up the $15 and stuck it in his pants until he went back to the sideline. Garcon offered the running back half.
“I said, ’Nah, just give me five,” Jones said, calling for a finder’s fee. “I’ve never even seen money on a field. I don’t know who had it. We were laughing so hard. It was funny.”
That’s the type of day it was for the Redskins. Every thing seemed to turn in their favor. The Dallas Cowboys lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The Philadelphia Eagles lost to the Miami Dolphins. The New York Giants lost to the New England Patriots on a last-second field goal. Washington is now just a half-game behind the Giants in the mediocre NFC East.
Of course every win is important, but coach Jay Gruden emphasized the heightened sense of urgency surrounding the team this week with games looming against the Carolina Panthers and the Giants.
Now that the Redskins accomplished their goal this week, the focus is quickly shifted toward a tough road game against the 9-0 Panthers.
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“Now it’s about expectation levels, and their expectation level’s got to be higher,” coach Jay Gruden said. “We play an undefeated Carolina Panthers next week. So they can enjoy this win for a few hours and then it’s back to work Monday and Tuesday. I’m very happy to get to 4-5, keep ourselves rolling, keep ourselves in this race in the NFC East and we’ll just go from there.”
With that, here are three takeaways from Sunday’s win:
** It may have been easy to forget this over the last six games, but an effective running game works wonders for the offense. The Redskins rushed for 213 yards against the Saints and it opened up everything. Kirk Cousins finished the game with a perfect 158.3 passer rating. He completed 20 of 25 passes for 324 yards and four touchdowns. Nine different players caught a pass as Cousins was able to spread the ball. The Redskins worked the Saints with short passes and screen plays and when Cousins’ first reads weren’t available, he was able to check down to his running backs. Most importantly, the Redskins never trailed against New Orleans after falling behind by at least 17 points in the last two games.
“It helps a lot when you can just dump the ball off and the next thing you know it’s a first down and more,” Cousins said. “It was good to see our screen game worked, running the ball worked, not just one type of run but several, and we spread the ball around and targeted a lot of different guys. All of those I think are positives. It was just a great week.
** The secondary was finally healthy, which allowed the Redskins to experiment with some different looks. Cornerbacks Bashaud Breeland and Chris Culliver started at the outside positions, while Kyshoen Jarrett and Will Blackmon worked the nickel and dime packages. Jeron Johnson started at strong safety in place of a struggling Trenton Robinson, however corner DeAngelo Hall took reps there on some third downs. Though there were some communication issues at times, that could be a helpful way to keep everybody involved. The complexion could change once Hall is fully healthy, but for now the Redskins are trying to keep their best players on the field.
“I think we started to see our best players back there in the secondary,” Gruden said. “It’s good to have our horses back there.”
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** The Redskins’ defense allowed an opponent to rush for 150 yards for the fifth consecutive week. The Saints rushed for 158 yards on 25 carries, though it’s not as entirely alarming as the previous weeks. The troubling aspect is that they still surrendered the big play — this one in the form of a 70-yard gain from Mark Ingram after poor tackling. Take that away and the Redskins allowed 88 yards on 24 carries, or an average of 3.67 per carry. That’s an improvement, but the Redskins need to find a way to eliminate the explosive runs. It only takes one to swing the momentum of the game, though it was hardly a factor on Sunday.
• Anthony Gulizia can be reached at agulizia@washingtontimes.com.
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