GREEN BAY – The defending Super Bowl champions are coming to Lambeau Field for a primetime showdown.
It happened two years ago, too, and it worked out well for the Packers then. They beat the reigning champion Kansas City Chiefs under the Lambeau lights, a win that helped springboard Green Bay into the postseason.
But Monday night's visit from the Philadelphia Eagles is different on a number of levels.
First, back in 2023 against Kansas City, the Packers were coming off a major victory, knocking off the Lions in Detroit on Thanksgiving. A young team on the rise appeared to be hitting its stride. This time, Green Bay just played its worst game of the season in a frustrating loss to the Panthers, so the Packers are in bounce-back mode.
Second, the Chiefs matchup had none of the recent history this one does. On their way to the Super Bowl title last year, the Eagles beat the Packers in Week 1 in Brazil and again in the NFC Wild Card playoffs to start their postseason run. So the familiarity here is distinct.
Third, with the Chiefs two years ago, there was no chance that team would stand in the Packers' way in the NFC playoffs on the road to a potential Super Bowl berth. It feels almost a given the Eagles will, and that was squarely on the players' minds over the past week as they answered various questions about how big this game is and what it means.
DL Micah Parsons: "I don't think there's a bigger test than the Super Bowl champs. They've done something that we haven't done. It's like, 'How do we get over that hump?' I mean, we're going to have to see them again. This is a team that's going to be a playoff team, it's going to be a team that we could potentially go against in the playoffs – deep in the playoffs. You just don't know how it goes, but it's like, 'How can we win the big games?' Because that's what it's going to take."
S Xavier McKinney: "Measuring stick? I wouldn't really say all of that, but I think it's a big game for both teams, just knowing that we could potentially see each other again later on down the line. So I think this game kind of sets that up."
QB Jordan Love: "I mean, having two Ls to this team last year, losing (in) the playoffs to them … if you make playoffs, you know you're definitely going to see a team like this again. So you've got to maximize these opportunities, and you want to go win this game."
This actually marks the third time in four years the Packers have hosted the defending Super Bowl champs at Lambeau after more than two decades passed without such a matchup occurring.
The Rams came to Lambeau Field in 2022, on a Monday night no less, but with QB Matthew Stafford injured, L.A. was a shell of its championship self and the Packers won rather handily. Before that, a visit from Baltimore in 2001 was the last time the reigning champions came to Lambeau, and Green Bay won that, too.
In between, the Packers traveled to play the defending Super Bowl champs six times – at New England in '02 (W), at Tampa Bay in '03 (W), at Pittsburgh in '09 (L), at N.Y. Giants in '12 (L), at Baltimore in '13 (W), and at Seattle in '14 (L). It's a total of seven road matchups if the regular-season and playoff losses to Seattle in '14 count as two.
All told, in home and away meetings against the defending champs since the turn of the century, the Packers are 6-4. But back to the here and now.
This Eagles team looks every bit the Super Bowl contender once again. At 6-2, it's worth pointing out their two losses came in a span of five days – when they blew a 17-point, fourth-quarter lead at home to Denver and then lost again at the NFC East-rival Giants on the ensuing Thursday night.
Outside of that five-day (five-quarter?) lull, they've beaten the Chiefs in a Super Bowl rematch and knocked off both the Rams and Buccaneers, who are atop their respective divisions. They also exacted quick revenge on the Giants right before their bye last week, an indication that Thursday night defeat was more a fluke than cause for concern.
At 5-2-1, the Packers have been even more up and down, with standout wins over the 2024 NFC finalist Lions and (then-healthy) Commanders to start the season, plus a road triumph over the AFC North-leading Steelers. In the same breath, they're one of only two teams Cleveland has beaten, and Carolina's Bryce Young was 2-15 as a road starting QB in his brief career before last week.
Will this Eagles game, with all it entails, be another moment the Packers rise to the occasion?
"They got a good team, but it's not the first good team that we played all year," McKinney said. "We played them twice last year and lost to them twice. So, you know, we're trying to get our get-back, but it's not going to be easy."
Anything but, yet opportunity is most certainly knocking.
"We're coming for the top of the mountain," Parsons said. "They're coming to Lambeau to show why they're on top of the mountain, and we're showing them why we're climbing the mountain.
"It's going to be a dogfight."
