NFL schedule leak? Eagles to host Vikings in season opener

When the 2018 NFL regular season opens, the Eagles are reportedly going to host an NFC Championship Game rematch.

It has become tradition for the defending Super Bowl champion to host the Thursday night NFL season opener the following season, and the Philadelphia Eagles will do it in September. Their opponent is yet to be officially determined. But according to Howard Eskin of 94 WIP radio and Fox 29 TV in Philadelphia, the Minnesota Vikings will be coming back to town for the 2018 opener.

The season opener will be a rematch of the NFC Championship Game in January, when the Eagles routed the favored Vikings, 38-7. They of course went on the win Super Bowl LII, in the Vikings’ home stadium, with an MVP performance from Nick Foles.

But both teams may have a different man at the most important position on the field in the NFC  Championship Game rematch.

If Carson Wentz is back to full strength from a torn ACL, he’ll replace Foles as Philadelphia’s starting quarterback. The Vikings have replaced Case Keenum, as well as fellow free agents Teddy Bridgewater and Sam Bradford, with a big move for Kirk Cousins.

Cousins will not be unfamiliar to the Eagles, with the six starts he made against them over the last three seasons for the division-rival Redskins as a reference. The last two seasons of Cousins against Philadelphia, against Jim Schwartz’s defense, should be especially relevant to the game plan on both sides.

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Regardless of who would be playing the Eagles, the 2018 NFL season opener will grab big television ratings and garner plenty of interest as fans thirst for the return of football. But the Vikings coming back to Lincoln Financial Field, after signing the biggest free agency fish this offseason, adds extra juice to that game.