Nick Sirianni

Q. I know you wanted to get TE Dallas Goedert some reps there in the last game, but what does he bring to the run game when you get him back? (Jeff McLane)

NICK SIRIANNI: Physical blocker. Does the things that you need your tight end to do. Being able to hold the point on the front side, very athletic on the back side. Just able to do a lot of different things and be multiple. You can be more multiple in your schemes with him in there.

Obviously, [TE] Dallas [Goedert] is a big playmaker when the ball is in his hands, we saw that in the return of him yesterday. But what makes him a complete tight end is his ability to block and all the different schemes that he can do. So that’s big to get him back for both the run and the pass game.

Q. A lot of guys in the locker room said that they saw that the Packers are a different team than they were towards the end of the season as opposed to early in the season. As you guys are developing this game plan, what do you see that’s different from the Packers? (Chris Franklin)

NICK SIRIANNI: Still obviously early on in our stages of scouting them, but teams develop from game one to game where we are now, 18. Everyone’s a different team. Some teams have different players because of injuries. Schemes, you start to get used to what you’re good at, what you’re not good at. So everybody is in a different mode than they were Week 1.

Now there are things that are staples that have been good for them, that have been good for us, that remain the same. But there are a lot of changes and a lot of differences.

At the end of the day though, I see a really well coached, fundamentally sound football team with a lot of really good football players. A lot of really solid football players on that roster. This is a really good football team that we’re playing here on Sunday.

Q. Kind of following up about that, they were the first to see your offense with RB Saquon Barkley. How much do you feel like they know who you are? And how much do you think that, towards RB Saquon Barkley, they are prepared for the second go-round? (Brooks Kubena)

NICK SIRIANNI: Again, the team is different from when we played Week 1 until now. A lot of things have changed [for] both teams. So I can’t answer what they think there or how they think there.

I know they’ll be paying attention to [RB] Saquon [Barkley] like everybody else that we play pays attention to him.

Again, got a lot of respect for how they’ve coached their defense. A lot of good guys out there. [Packers DE Rashan Gary] Number 52 is an outstanding player, [Packers DL T.J. Slaton] 93, [Packers LB Quay Walker] Number 7. They’ve got players at every level. [Packers CB Keisean Nixon] 25 is a playmaker. [Packers S] Xavier McKinney, obviously we know him well, big time playmaker who can take the football away, who’s done a good job of that against us.

They’ve got some special guys on that [defense], and I think they’re really well coached.

Q. With the way QB Tanner McKee has played the last couple of weeks and with QB Kenny Pickett’s injury, any thought to making QB Tanner McKee the backup as you enter the playoffs? (Dave Zangaro)

NICK SIRIANNI: I have a lot of confidence in both of the guys. I think when [QB] Kenny [Pickett] has had to play, he’s played really well. When [QB] Tanner [McKee] has had to play, he’s played really well. So we’ve got a really good room. Obviously [QB] Jalen [Hurts] has had an outstanding season. We just have a great room.

Credit to [Executive Vice President/General Manager] Howie [Roseman] and his staff for getting these guys in here. Then just a great job by these guys, taking advantage of their opportunities, and great job by [Offensive Coordinator] Kellen [Moore], [Passing Game Coordinator/Associate Head Coach] Kevin [Patullo], [Quarterbacks Coach] Doug [Nussmeier], helping these guys develop.

So we feel really, really good about the room and where we are.

Q. A little bit along those lines, obviously you played a lot of backups, reserves yesterday and everything. Did any of them stand out? And in particular, a guy like WR Jahan Dotson who’s been a third wide receiver this year, hasn’t really gotten a lot of targets. Does a game like this help him going into the playoffs? (Martin Frank)

NICK SIRIANNI: I think anytime, you build on your performances. We really pride ourselves in that we’re going to get better from every performance that we have, win, lose, play good, play bad. Yeah, anytime you go out and play a solid game and play well, that’s going to give you some confidence to move on to the next one.

[WR] Jahan [Dotson] played a really good game. Was good in and out of the breaks, caught the ball really clean, had some moments with the ball in his hands on yards after the catch.

I think one thing that we’ve really enjoyed about Jahan is that he came in here and fit right in with the rest of the guys, just playing tough and playing physical. He’s scrappy out there, and he’s been scrappy since the day he got here. He’s affecting the game even when he’s not touching the football.

It was good to see him get his hands on the ball yesterday and do the things that he can do yesterday. That was exciting to see, and I know we’re going to need him to make plays throughout the postseason. This will be a big game for all of us this weekend.

Q. Now that you’re past Week 18, a lot of people say ‘Treat it like a preseason game,’ but you don’t have 90 guys, so some got to rest, some had to dress, some had to play. Now that you’re past it, how do you think the guys handled that, especially the ones that did have to play? (John McMullen)

NICK SIRIANNI: They took advantage of their opportunity to play to get better. Again, you couldn’t rest everybody. Like you said, you don’t have 90 guys on the team to be able to do that.

I thought [DT] Jordan Davis went out and played one of his best games that he’s had here as an Eagle. He was outstanding. I think there were a lot of guys that had really outstanding – like [LB] Oren Burks had 17 tackles. I mean, that’s incredible. [S] Sydney [Brown] made a huge play that sealed the game. [CB] Isaiah [Rodgers] had a huge return. All those different things. We got of lot of contributions from a lot of different [guys].

I thought the offensive line played great. All those guys across the O-line – [T/G] Jack Driscoll, [T/G Darian Kinnard] DK – had some really good performances. And we know Tanner played a really solid game. So you got a lot of performances from a lot of different guys.

And as you see, the guys I named were a lot of different – some are backups, some are rotational players, some are starters, all those guys that I just mentioned. So it took everybody’s contribution, and everybody put everything they had into that game to get ourselves that win and to play to our standard of how we want to play football.

[DT] Milton Williams played really good. Just a lot of different guys that have different roles on this football team that went out and busted their butts. I think that says a lot about our guys.

Q. I was wondering if you could kind of outline some of the things Defensive Coordinator Vic Fangio was able to do this year to turn the defense around with a lot of new pieces, a lot of guys who hadn’t played before, rookies, guys at new positions? And it all came together pretty quickly. (Reuben Frank)

NICK SIRIANNI: I think [Defensive Coordinator] Vic [Fangio] works his butt off and is constantly trying to find new ways to help his defensive scheme get better. And then I think he just does such a good job of holding everybody accountable to how he wants it to look. He’s got a great vision of how he wants it to look and how he sees it. He holds people accountable to that.

And I think he calls a great game. I think he goes in there, and he’s got so much experience calling games. He’s just got a great feel for it.

And I love that – we talk about scheme, but then Vic is so obsessed, too, with the fundamentals of how you tackle, how you get off blocks. I love his tackling meeting on Saturday nights where he’s going over all the different ways that these guys run the football, how we’re going to have to tackle, the things that can present problems, and goes through all that detail there.

Just a ton of experience and a great, detailed coach that has had a lot of success in this league, and obviously we’ve had a lot of success this year. He’s just done a great job coaching the coaches on our staff and coaching the guys. It’s been a great group effort on that defensive side of the football.

Q. I’ll ask the QB Jalen Hurts question today. As you put the game plan together, is it with the intention of QB Jalen Hurts as the starting quarterback this weekend? (Zach Berman)

NICK SIRIANNI: I have no new information for you guys. Like I said yesterday, [he’s] progressing through the protocol.

Q. Are you able to say if he’s in the building today? (Zach Berman)

NICK SIRIANNI: I’ve got no new info for you guys here today. I’m sorry.

Q. I’m just curious why you went to P Braden Mann on kickoffs yesterday after K Jake Elliott the week prior? (Bo Wulf)

NICK SIRIANNI: Every situation calls for something different. And as you saw, [K] Jake [Elliott] kicked off a couple as well. There are a lot of different factors that go into it.

Haven’t decided who is doing it in the playoffs against Green Bay. We’ll see, and everything will be accounted for.

I think at the end of day though, we have two guys that we feel are very capable. Obviously don’t ever want a penalty. I think that was our only penalty of the day yesterday, was kind of hoping that we didn’t have any penalties yesterday. But a lot of confidence in both guys, but we can’t make that mistake of kicking it out of bounds there.

Q. This is of course your fourth trip to the postseason with the Eagles as head coach. I’m curious, what, if anything, did you learn from your other three trips that you’ll use to inform the way that you approach this upcoming postseason trip, whether it’s for things that you liked that you did in the past or things that maybe you learned from that you didn’t like as much? (Olivia Reiner)

NICK SIRIANNI: I think after every situation you go through, you make notes and you try to go through what you did well, what you didn’t do well. I think at the end of the day, the higher the stakes get as we get into single elimination football, the more you’ve got to stay committed to the things you’ve done on a daily basis to get 14 wins.

I think that’s been my biggest thing. It’s like, ‘What can you do different here now?’ And it’s not even different. It always comes back to, what got you here? What got you here? What got you 14 wins?

That doesn’t mean you’re not looking to improve on the things that you can do better at, which is exactly what we’re doing, trying to shore up every single thing we possibly can. But what are the core things that got you to this situation?

And when everybody’s talking about single elimination football – ‘What happens this?’, ‘Well, what happens in three weeks if you do this or this?’, bum-bum, bum-bum, bum-bum – that we stay committed to completely what we’re doing.

That’s what we’ve tried to do all year, and that’s the point, right? Is, what has gotten you to the Number 2 seed in the NFC with the NFC East title? Stick to those principles, tough, detailed, together, and really double-, triple-, quadruple-down on those things.