Looking back at Andy Reid’s history against Indianapolis Colts
By David Thomas
November 21st, 1999 — A 44-17 loss
This was not only the first matchup between Reid and the Colts, but it was also Reid’s very first season as head coach of the Eagles. He would go on to finish the season that 5-11, his opening day QB was his future offensive coordinator and current Jacksonville Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson.
This game was Donovan McNabb’s 2nd start as the Eagle’s starting QB of the future, which is really the most notable thing about this game. McNabb was still pretty raw at this point and only produced 173 total yards, 1 passing TD, and 2 INTs. This was only the beginning for Reid, and a matchup against Peyton Manning was too much at this point.
November 10th, 2002 —A 35-13 loss
The next matchup came 3 years later in week 10. This is one of the stronger Eagles teams to face the Colts, and yet as you can already see it wasn’t enough. The Eagles starting team suffered only 3 losses that season, and this was easily the worst of them. They would go on to make it to the NFC Championship game later that season.
Manning had a perfect passer rating with Colts wide receivers Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne totaling 258 yards and 3 TDs through the air, and Colts’ running back James Mungro totaled 114 yards and 2 TDs on the ground.
The Eagles could just never really get anything going on offense and it was a sloppy day overall. Three drives ended with a turnover on downs, two ended with a fumble, and three ended with punts. The final drive of the game ended 10 yards from the end zone with the clock striking zero.
November 26th, 2006 — A 45-21 loss
The third consecutive loss for Reid against the Colts, and this one wasn’t much better than the others. Starting QB McNabb suffered a season-ending injury in the previous game. Backup journeyman quarterback Jeff Garcia had a respectable performance, and this was the only loss of the season for the Eagles with Garcia at QB.
The big performer for the Colts in this game was not Manning, but running back Joseph Addai who totaled 171 rushing yards and 4 rushing touchdowns. This Colts team would go on to win the Super Bowl against the Chicago Bears, so a “quality” loss for the Eagles.
November 7th 2010 — A 26-24 win
This was Reid’s final game against the Colts as head coach of the Eagles, and he finally managed a win! It was a quality day for the Eagles overall with new Eagles quarterback Michael Vick totaling 292 yards and 2 TDs. DeSean Jackson had a signature day with a 58-yard-long bomb and 1 touchdown for 108 total yards.
On the defensive side, the Eagles managed to pick off Manning twice and put him on the ground with 3 sacks. The Colts’ ground game didn’t fair much better totaling just 62 total yards and 2 short touchdowns.
With that, the next time Reid would face the Colts would be after he was let go from the Eagles and moved on to the Kansas City Chiefs. So let’s hop on over and see how things went.