New York Times Post-Game Perspective
Giants Lose to Dallas in Heartbreaking Fashion
By JOHN BRANCH
Published: December 3, 2006
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J., Dec. 3 — The Giants, in finding more heartbreaking ways to lose games and their grip on their playoff hopes, outdid themselves against the Dallas Cowboys today, losing on a 46-yard field goal by Martin Gramatica, who was signed by the Cowboys last week.
The kick, with 1 second remaining, gave the Cowboys a 23-20 victory and sent the Giants to their fourth-straight loss. Now 6-6, the one-time championship contender is faced with at least one more week of uncomfortable speculation and scrutiny.
The game of the season for the Giants became a match between the quarterbacks. And the one who spent more than three seasons on the bench, not in the spotlight, won.
Tony Romo, the league’s hottest quarterback, led the Cowboys on a 12-play, 66-yard touchdown drive late in the fourth quarter. Given a chance to respond, Giants quarterback Eli Manning, the first overall choice of the 2004 draft who has been ice-cold in recent weeks, led his team to the tying score, a 5-yard pass to Plaxico Burress, with 66 seconds left.
That was plenty of time for Romo and the Cowboys. Romo lobbed a deep pass to tight end Jason Witten, who found a soft spot between linebacker Antonio Pierce and safety Will Demps for a 42-yard completion.
Four plays later, the Cowboys (8-4) were running around the field in ecstasy and the Giants were in their familiar stun mode.
The Giants, who had blown a 21-point fourth-quarter lead a week ago, had a difficult week of attempted recovery. Today, they continued their bungling ways, at least in spots. They assembled and displayed, at critical junctures, all the requisite parts of their three-game meltdown — unseemly personal fouls, questionable play calling, squandered drives and mysterious gaffes.
A victory would have washed away the chaos of the prior three weeks, when the Giants lost three times and bickered with anyone who frequents Giants Stadium — coaches, other players and reporters included.
Instead, the Giants take their reality show back on the road, against another struggling playoff contender, the Carolina Panthers, next Sunday.
In the parity rife N.F.L., and particularly in the sagging National Football Conference, four consecutive losses in November and December do not end a team’s playoff hopes. The Giants fell two games behind the Cowboys in the N.F.C. East. They likely need to win at least three of their final four games to make the postseason, probably as a wild-card team.
A week ago, the Giants fell to the Tennessee Titans, 24-21. Star players continued a habit of making sharp critiques in the media — this time, injured defensive end Michael Strahan questioned the will of receiver Plaxico Burress.
But the Giants vowed to rally around the growing legions of doubters who had witnessed a championship team seeming to implode in slow motion over the course of several weeks. And they appeared to get a boost from return of several defensive players, back from injuries: defensive end Osi Umenyiora, cornerback Sam Madison and linebacker Brandon Short.
It helped create a competitive game, between teams that looked far more evenly matched than their recent performances predicted. Still, the Giants fought two opponents — the Cowboys, and themselves.
The Giants eschewed a 41-yard field-goal attempt in the first half and, needed inches for a first down, lost 3 yards. They intercepted a pass, only to fumble it right back to the Cowboys, who marched on to score. They were penalized for a late hit and for head butting. They drove impressively to the Dallas 4-yard line twice in the second half, only to settle for the bitter taste of short field goals.
The Giants’ three-game losing streak had coincided with Manning’s worst three games of the season — though the relationship is more than coincidental. He threw two touchdowns and six interceptions during losses to Chicago, Jacksonville and Tennessee.
Against the Cowboys, the Giants put a governor on their passing plays, trying to get Manning into a mistake-free rhythm with a mix heavy on short passes and screens, often with the quarterback rolling out to avoid the pass rush.
That lifted his sagging completion percentage and allowed the Giants to sustain drives, even as the Cowboys slowed Barber and the Giants’ rushing attack.
And when the team first needed a big play today, something more improvised and a little less restrained, Manning provided it with a 17-yard touchdown pass to tight end Jeremy Shockey in the first quarter. Manning dropped back, then slipped left to avoid the rush of linebacker Bradie James and flung the ball to Shockey in the left corner of the end zone.
But Manning struggled to do anything out of the ordinary after that.
The defense played well, and intercepted Romo twice in the first half. They did not convert either break into points. But the Cowboys did.
The Cowboys earned their first touchdown on a drive — two, officially — that could only happen against the Giants, and to their rookie defensive end, Mathias Kiwanuka. The Cowboys were driving until Kiwanuka intercepted a deflected pass.
But Kiwanuka, bitten by bad fortune for the second week in a row, fumbled the ball on the return without being nudged by anyone, as if stripped by a phantom. The Cowboys recovered to start a new drive, and scored three plays later, helped by a 26-yard pass interference penalty on middle linebacker Antonio Pierce.
It signaled a return of the bumbling Giants. Fullback Jim Finn dropped a pass from Manning. After a false-start penalty, Manning threw a ball away. A third-down pass bounced off the chest of tight end Jeremy Shockey.
On the next drive, the Giants drove across midfield, but were stopped after receiver Plaxico Burress drew an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty by taking a running start and blocking safety Keith Davis — long after Tiki Barber, the player with the ball, had been tackled.
The Giants spoiled a long drive late in the second quarter with a pair of debatable decisions. On third-and-20, receiver David Tyree slid and caught a 19-yard pass from Manning. Had Tyree realized that no one had touched him, he could have rolled over before a defender touched him, and the Giants would have had a first down.
On fourth-and-1 from the Dallas 24, with 1 minute 30 seconds left in the half, the Giants eschewed a 41-yard field-goal attempt. They handed the ball to linebacker-sized running back Brandon Jacobs, who tried to gain the yard around the left end. He was caught and dragged down for a 3-yard loss by linebacker DeMarcus Ware.
The Cowboys took possession and, using eight plays and three timeouts, moved downfield for a 41-yard field goal by Martin Gramatica.
By JOHN BRANCH
Published: December 3, 2006
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J., Dec. 3 — The Giants, in finding more heartbreaking ways to lose games and their grip on their playoff hopes, outdid themselves against the Dallas Cowboys today, losing on a 46-yard field goal by Martin Gramatica, who was signed by the Cowboys last week.
The kick, with 1 second remaining, gave the Cowboys a 23-20 victory and sent the Giants to their fourth-straight loss. Now 6-6, the one-time championship contender is faced with at least one more week of uncomfortable speculation and scrutiny.
The game of the season for the Giants became a match between the quarterbacks. And the one who spent more than three seasons on the bench, not in the spotlight, won.
Tony Romo, the league’s hottest quarterback, led the Cowboys on a 12-play, 66-yard touchdown drive late in the fourth quarter. Given a chance to respond, Giants quarterback Eli Manning, the first overall choice of the 2004 draft who has been ice-cold in recent weeks, led his team to the tying score, a 5-yard pass to Plaxico Burress, with 66 seconds left.
That was plenty of time for Romo and the Cowboys. Romo lobbed a deep pass to tight end Jason Witten, who found a soft spot between linebacker Antonio Pierce and safety Will Demps for a 42-yard completion.
Four plays later, the Cowboys (8-4) were running around the field in ecstasy and the Giants were in their familiar stun mode.
The Giants, who had blown a 21-point fourth-quarter lead a week ago, had a difficult week of attempted recovery. Today, they continued their bungling ways, at least in spots. They assembled and displayed, at critical junctures, all the requisite parts of their three-game meltdown — unseemly personal fouls, questionable play calling, squandered drives and mysterious gaffes.
A victory would have washed away the chaos of the prior three weeks, when the Giants lost three times and bickered with anyone who frequents Giants Stadium — coaches, other players and reporters included.
Instead, the Giants take their reality show back on the road, against another struggling playoff contender, the Carolina Panthers, next Sunday.
In the parity rife N.F.L., and particularly in the sagging National Football Conference, four consecutive losses in November and December do not end a team’s playoff hopes. The Giants fell two games behind the Cowboys in the N.F.C. East. They likely need to win at least three of their final four games to make the postseason, probably as a wild-card team.
A week ago, the Giants fell to the Tennessee Titans, 24-21. Star players continued a habit of making sharp critiques in the media — this time, injured defensive end Michael Strahan questioned the will of receiver Plaxico Burress.
But the Giants vowed to rally around the growing legions of doubters who had witnessed a championship team seeming to implode in slow motion over the course of several weeks. And they appeared to get a boost from return of several defensive players, back from injuries: defensive end Osi Umenyiora, cornerback Sam Madison and linebacker Brandon Short.
It helped create a competitive game, between teams that looked far more evenly matched than their recent performances predicted. Still, the Giants fought two opponents — the Cowboys, and themselves.
The Giants eschewed a 41-yard field-goal attempt in the first half and, needed inches for a first down, lost 3 yards. They intercepted a pass, only to fumble it right back to the Cowboys, who marched on to score. They were penalized for a late hit and for head butting. They drove impressively to the Dallas 4-yard line twice in the second half, only to settle for the bitter taste of short field goals.
The Giants’ three-game losing streak had coincided with Manning’s worst three games of the season — though the relationship is more than coincidental. He threw two touchdowns and six interceptions during losses to Chicago, Jacksonville and Tennessee.
Against the Cowboys, the Giants put a governor on their passing plays, trying to get Manning into a mistake-free rhythm with a mix heavy on short passes and screens, often with the quarterback rolling out to avoid the pass rush.
That lifted his sagging completion percentage and allowed the Giants to sustain drives, even as the Cowboys slowed Barber and the Giants’ rushing attack.
And when the team first needed a big play today, something more improvised and a little less restrained, Manning provided it with a 17-yard touchdown pass to tight end Jeremy Shockey in the first quarter. Manning dropped back, then slipped left to avoid the rush of linebacker Bradie James and flung the ball to Shockey in the left corner of the end zone.
But Manning struggled to do anything out of the ordinary after that.
The defense played well, and intercepted Romo twice in the first half. They did not convert either break into points. But the Cowboys did.
The Cowboys earned their first touchdown on a drive — two, officially — that could only happen against the Giants, and to their rookie defensive end, Mathias Kiwanuka. The Cowboys were driving until Kiwanuka intercepted a deflected pass.
But Kiwanuka, bitten by bad fortune for the second week in a row, fumbled the ball on the return without being nudged by anyone, as if stripped by a phantom. The Cowboys recovered to start a new drive, and scored three plays later, helped by a 26-yard pass interference penalty on middle linebacker Antonio Pierce.
It signaled a return of the bumbling Giants. Fullback Jim Finn dropped a pass from Manning. After a false-start penalty, Manning threw a ball away. A third-down pass bounced off the chest of tight end Jeremy Shockey.
On the next drive, the Giants drove across midfield, but were stopped after receiver Plaxico Burress drew an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty by taking a running start and blocking safety Keith Davis — long after Tiki Barber, the player with the ball, had been tackled.
The Giants spoiled a long drive late in the second quarter with a pair of debatable decisions. On third-and-20, receiver David Tyree slid and caught a 19-yard pass from Manning. Had Tyree realized that no one had touched him, he could have rolled over before a defender touched him, and the Giants would have had a first down.
On fourth-and-1 from the Dallas 24, with 1 minute 30 seconds left in the half, the Giants eschewed a 41-yard field-goal attempt. They handed the ball to linebacker-sized running back Brandon Jacobs, who tried to gain the yard around the left end. He was caught and dragged down for a 3-yard loss by linebacker DeMarcus Ware.
The Cowboys took possession and, using eight plays and three timeouts, moved downfield for a 41-yard field goal by Martin Gramatica.
posted by The Gryphon at 9:28 PM
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