2025 NFL playoffs: Eagles’ Saquon Barkley will have to defy NFL history if he wants to have big game vs. Rams

Heading into their divisional showdown against the Los Angeles Rams, the Philadelphia Eagles are probably feeling pretty good about their rushing attack. After all, when these two teams met back in Week 12, the Eagles ran for a season-high 314 yards with most of that coming from Saquon Barkley, who rushed for a career-high 255 yards in Philadelphia’s 37-20 win. 

Although Barkley had his way with the Rams’ defense in the first meeting, there’s no guarantee that’s going to happen in the rematch. As a matter of fact, if NFL history is any indication, there’s a good chance that Barkley won’t even rush for half of what he did in the first meeting. 

Barkley is the eighth player in NFL history to rush for at least 200 yards against a team in the regular-season and then face that same team in the postseason. Of the previous seven players, ALL SEVEN of them were held under 100 yards in the playoff meeting. That’s right, none of the players who topped 200 yards against an opponent in the regular-season were even able to hit 100 yards in the postseason rematch. 

Here’s a look at how that’s played out over the course of NFL history: 

That’s 43 yards per game in the playoffs for a group of running backs that all hit the 200-yard mark against the the same opponent. 

Based on these numbers, it’s pretty clear that defenses take it personal when they get stream rolled in the regular season and they do everything possible to make sure it doesn’t happen against in the postseason. These seven running backs went a combined 3-4 in the playoffs after going 5-2 in the regular season matchups. 

The loss to the Eagles ended up being a turning point for the Rams’ defense. Since that loss, they’ve only surrendered 14.8 points per game in the six games where their starters have played (They rested most of their starters in Week 18). They’ve also surrendered just 100.5 rushing yards per game in that span after giving up 314 to the Eagles. 

Rams coach Sean McVay is well aware that stopping Barkley will be a key to the game. Barkely is a dangerous runner because he can run through you, run around you or even hurdle you while jumping backwards like he did on one play earlier his year. 

“That’s the thing that makes Saquon so special,” McVay said this week.”He’s patient and he hits you for a couple of those runs but if he gets clean to the second and third levels, he’s such a slash runner and he has the speed to finish. That’s why he’s such a dynamic player. I think our sense of urgency will be appropriate for the task at hand this week. We love it and we’re looking forward to it, but we have a ton of respect for this group.”

Besides slowing down the Eagles rushing attack, McVay would probably also love to get his ground game going and that’s mostly because the Eagles went 4-3 this season (including the playoffs) when surrendering 110 yards or more on the ground, but 11-0 when they held a team under that number.