The games took place in two different countries, but the Packers ended their season the same way they started it.
They lost to the Eagles in Brazil in Week One and they lost again in Philadelphia on Sunday afternoon’s NFC Wild Card game. They committed a flurry of turnovers and penalties while suffering several injuries on the way to a 22-10 final score that kept them from advancing to the divisional round for the second straight season.
While that was a disappointing outcome, head coach Matt LaFleur said he hopes that the way things played out serves as a building block for future success.
“Yeah, I think it just goes back to show you, like the importance of getting these home-field games, in my opinion,” LaFleur said, via a transcript from the Eagles. “We have a really tough division, and you know, I’m hoping our guys use that for fuel this offseason to dig a little bit deeper and come back a little bit better, each individually, because collectively, that’ll make a huge difference. Obviously we’ll comb through everything. I think it was, you know, we still have a young football team. I’m not making excuses or anything like that. We have a young football team that, unfortunately, this is a tough lesson along the way. Hopefully we can use this as fuel to get better and learn and be a better team come next year.”
Getting home playoff games will require winning the division, which is a tough task when the Lions and Vikings are also in the NFC North. The Packers will need to compete with and outlast those teams to progress, however, and getting to that point will be the priority for their offseason.
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