The Eagles were not content to stab us in the heart once. They decided to rip out our guts three different times during Sunday’s excruciating loss to the Cardinals in the NFC Championship Game.

First, they forgot to show up for the first half. Maybe they thought game time was 5 p.m., instead of 3. They certainly played like it.

The Eagles sleep-walked through the first half on both sides of the ball. As they trudged into the locker room, they were down 24-6. The hissing sound was the air going out of the balloon at all those playoff parties around the Delaware Valley.

We had seen this act before, but certainly they wouldn’t do it again, not against the Arizona Cardinals. The oddsmakers installed the Birds as 4-point favorites.

The offense sputtered, managing just two David Akers field goals. It had all the earmarks of classic Eagles. Donovan McNabb missing wide open receivers, throwing balls into the ground, or behind receivers who if hit in stride were looking at nothing but wide open spaces. The run game again appeared to be non-existent.

All that we’ve seen before, and have become accustomed to. What no one was expecting was for Kurt Warner and the Arizona Cardinals to thoroughly filet the Eagles’ vaunted defense.

The defense has been the team’s backbone, spurring this remarkable playoff run. But it was nowhere in sight in the first half. It was believed the Eagles had to put pressure on Warner and contain dangerous wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald. They did neither.

The Eagles walked off the field at halftime with their tails between their legs. I don’t know who it was that came out for the third quarter, but it bore no resemblance to the team that fumbled through that first half.

The Eagles reeled off three consecutive touchdown drives while throttling the Cards’ offense. Incredibly, just a few minutes into the fourth quarter, the Eagles were sitting on a one-point lead, 26-25. There were a few ominous signs along the way, most of them supplied by kicker David Akers. He missed a field goal, and an extra point, then managed to dunk a kickoff out of bounds, setting up the Cardinals at the 35-yard line.

Time for heartbreak Number Two. After looking thoroughly befuddled and almost overmatched by the Eagles suddenly fired-up defense, Warner gets the ball back with about 9 minutes left in the game. Slowly, torturously, he starts moving the Cardinals down the field. The Eagles defense folds its tent, unable to protect the Eagles tenuous 2-point lead. The drive consumes 7:46. The successful two-point conversion means the Cards now lead by seven, 32-25.

Then came the coup de grace.

The Eagles get the ball back with 2:53 left to play, ball on their own 20. Eighty yards to go, almost three minutes to do it.

Raise your hand if you thought the Donovan McNabb was going to do something he has never done before, drive the Eagles the length of the field as the clock expired to win a game in which they were trailing.

Thought so. Another bitter defeat.

Andy Reid and Donovan McNabb have now played in five NFC Championship games. They have won one of them.

They have been favored in all but their first visit, when they fell to the same Kurt Warner who bedeviled them yesterday.

Sadly, we’ve seen it before.

There will be no all-Pennsylvania Super Bowl. The Steelers did their part, winning a slugfest against the Ravens.

The Eagles? They merely managed to stab their loyal fans in the heart.

And this time they did it three times in the same game.