Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, November 29, 1993 TAG: 9311290058
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JIM DUCIBELLA LANDMARK NEWS SERVICE
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Long
The circumstances were nearly the same Sunday at RFK Stadium, but the stakes were not nearly as high. A Philadelphia quarterback, his team trailing by four points in the waning moments, this time drove his team 75 yards in 12 plays for the winning touchdown in a 17-14 victory.
Instead of Randall Cunningham calling the shots, it was backup Bubby Brister. Instead of Calvin Williams catching the game-winning pass, it was running back James Joseph grabbing a 2-yard toss in front of Darrell Green with 46 seconds to play.
That enabled the Eagles (5-6) to end their six-game skid. The Redskins, meanwhile, ran their most recent losing streak to three games.
"But to be perfectly honest with you, we didn't play well enough to win the game," said Richie Petitbon, Washington's coach. "We would have won if we had stopped them on that last drive, but we just did too many things wrong. The results speak for themselves."
Petitbon was referring to his team's 10 penalties.
And his team's combustible play-calling, like the fake punt in the second quarter. Up-back Brian Mitchell could have passed to wide-open Danny Copeland, but instead chose closely guarded Todd Bowles.
Mitchell's basketball-style jump pass was intercepted by Philadelphia's Otis Smith at the Washington 27-yard line, leading to rookie Vaughn Hebron's 1-yard touchdown run and a 10-0 Redskins deficit.
Petitbon also was referring to Chip Lohmiller's shanked 35-yard field-goal attempt on the last snap of the first half, negating Mitchell's 48-yard punt return a few moments earlier.
"A big miss," Petitbon called it. "You like to go in [to the locker room] with some momentum. That took it away from us."
Until two fourth-quarter touchdowns, the home team's quality of play was so poor that after one late third-quarter sequence - a timeout called to avoid a delay-of-game penalty, Rich Gannon sacked Bengals notch first victory. B2 Giants slip past Cardinals. B2 Standings, summaries. B2 for a loss of 5 yards, Ricky Ervins nabbed for a loss of 2 and an illegal-formation penalty - owner Jack Kent Cooke briefly buried his head in his hands.
"Any time you lose a game like this, you can't feel too good about it," Petitbon said, asked to evaluate his coaching.
On the bright side, with Cincinnati's 16-10 upset of the Los Angeles Raiders, Washington gained ground on the moribund Bengals in the race for the No. 1 pick in the 1994 NFL draft.
The AFC's Bengals and New England Patriots are tied for the NFL's worst record at 1-10. The Redskins, the NFC's worst at 2-9, are just a hair behind - and closing fast.
"Right now, the only player who's having a heck of a year for us is Roby," Petitbon said.
That's Reggie Roby. He punts.
Sunday's loss came after Washington showed its only offensive spark of the game, two consecutive touchdown drives engineered by Gannon.
The first score came on a 17-yard pass from Gannon to receiver Tim McGee with 11:20 remaining. Gannon, who spent more time dancing through danger than Gene Kelly, rolled left, away from hard-charging Clyde Simmons and linebacker Brett Hager.
McGee's cover man, Mark McMillian, left him to converge on Gannon. The quarterback merely flipped the ball to McGee, who wasn't hit until the goal line.
After Washington forced the Eagles to punt, Gannon and McGee again combined again on a free-lance play, this one a 54-yarder to the Philadelphia 19. Five plays later, Gannon rolled right, looked for Desmond Howard in the middle, found him blanketed, then hit Art Monk on the right sideline of the end zone with 5:44 to go.
Suddenly, the towel-waving and hand-slapping returned to the Redskins sideline and among the relatively sparse RFK Stadium crowd of 46,663. The 'Skins had spent much of the day in abject silence. The fans had spent much of the day voicing their disapproval of Washington's offensive and defensive game plans.
"It doesn't take much to get this team excited," Gannon said. "Unfortunately, it didn't last long."
That's because Brister moved his team down the field methodically, just as Cunningham had in September. That day, Eagles coach Rich Kotite had called Cunningham "a surgeon," and Cunningham had responded by guaranteeing victory.
This time, things were different.
"I'm not going to tell you I said, `OK, we can do it,' " Brister said afterward. "We just went to work."
The winning drive began modestly, with a 2-yard completion to Herschel Walker, one of a career-high 10 receptions for Walker.
Then, a pass-interference penalty against Washington's Tom Carter netted 14 yards. That was followed by a 4-yard completion to Williams, an offsides penalty against the Redskins and two Brister runs totalling 4 yards.
Now the big gains. A 16-yard toss to Williams. Then another pass to Williams, this one for 11, giving Philadelphia a first down at the Redskins' 19 with two minutes to go.
Hebron, a rookie from Virginia Tech, then rattled through a host of would-be tacklers for 17 yards.
"A 2-yard gain," Washington linebacker Carl Banks disgustedly labeled it, before adding, "if we'd wrapped him up."
But the Redskins didn't. After seeing Hebron stopped on the next two snaps, Kotite had Brister fake to the first-year running back, then toss the ball to Joseph, who lined up as a tight end on the left side, then came across to the right side and into the end zone.
The ball arrived a second before Green. Washington again had avoided victory.
"I think we all needed this one, everyone in the organization," said Kotite, who took over play-calling duties from offensive coordinator Zeke Bratkowski.
In the other locker room, Bowles struggled for the words to describe yet another letdown.
"Each loss is different, but the hurt's the same," he said. "You get just as mad, just as frustrated. This thing has become a broken record we just can't fix right now.
Keywords:
FOOTBALL
by CNB