For six consecutive games, all of them victories, the Giants set out to prove that the start of their season was an aberration. Yet all those Sundays removed from a humiliating opening-day defeat to the Cowboys in Texas, the Giants squandered a second chance to make a strong impression and recast themselves as true title contenders. It looked like the start of the season, after all. On a cool evening in November, the Giants were undone by an eerily similar game to the one they lost on a warm night in September. They allowed a pair of long touchdown passes from Tony Romo to Terrell Owens in the second half and fell to the Cowboys, 31-20. The Giants (6-3) will probably play the final seven games for a wild-card entry into the postseason. They are two games behind the Cowboys (8-1) in the National Football Conference East, but the deficit is actually three because the Cowboys hold the tie breaker over the Giants by virtue of sweeping the season series. “You focus on winning football games, and when you get to the playoffs, anything can happen,” defensive end Michael Strahan said. “And who knows? Maybe we go to the playoffs and we play those guys again, and you have another shot at it.” When the Giants lost to the Cowboys, 45-35, in the season opener, and then to the Packers, 35-13, in the second game, there was reason to wonder if they were any good at all. Now the Giants know where they stand: firmly in the playoff hunt, but far behind the Cowboys and the Packers, who have identical records atop the N.F.C. They play each other in Dallas on Nov. 29. After the game, the Giants framed the loss in optimism. They pointed to their overall record and the resiliency it represents, and suggested that Sunday’s result stemmed from their mistakes as much as superlative play by the Cowboys. “I’m disappointed,” said Giants Coach Tom Coughlin, who called his team its “own worst enemy” against the Cowboys. “But I think we have a good football team,” he said. But on the way to the final score, the Giants revealed their inadequacies: a solid but susceptible defense unlikely to carry the franchise’s championship aspirations, and an inconsistent offensive attack that cannot keep up with the Cowboys. The Giants won six in a row largely because they allowed a league-best 13.2 points a game during the winning stretch. But the victories came against some of the N.F.L.’s weakest teams; the Giants’ previous four opponents have a combined 6-29 record. The Giants were bent on proving that though the winning streak might have been paved with patsies, it was not performed with mirrors. The score was tied at halftime, 17-17, but the Cowboys regained the lead on a drive that only teased the Giants’ hopes and fueled their regrets. Three times the defense forced a third down. Three times fans rose and spiritedly waved small white towels they were handed when they arrived, imploring the Giants to make a stop. Three times, the Cowboys made the first down, and the fans quieted and sat. Immediately after the third conversion, Romo lofted a perfect pass to Owens for a 25-yard touchdown. The tease continued on the kickoff. Ahmad Bradshaw burst past most of the Cowboys — and a yellow penalty flag flying the other way. Bradshaw was finally pushed out of bounds at the Cowboys’ 2-yard line, but the play was undone by a holding call on the rookie Kevin Boss. “I was just hoping it wasn’t to me,” Boss said of the flag thrown his direction. “Then I saw Ahmad down the sideline, and my heart kind of sank.” Rather than being 2 yards from tying the score, the Giants were 83 yards away, at their 17-yard line. They gamely tried taking the long road, even waiting until third down to make the biggest plays, including a 23-yard completion to Amani Toomer on third-and-10 near midfield. But as running back Brandon Jacobs crossed the goal line for what was cheered as a tying, 6-yard touchdown, a penalty flag flew from the hand of the referee Jeff Triplette. He called guard Chris Snee for holding, reversing the play and the game’s momentum with 14 minutes 9 seconds left. “It didn’t even come into my mind that it would have been me,” said Snee, who was pulling to the left and pushed aside safety Roy Williams, allowing Jacobs to run through a hole behind. “I was surprised and angry. I don’t know what else to say. If I gave him any doubt, then I guess it must have been on me.” The Giants followed with a delay of game penalty, one of seven penalties in the second half. Unraveled, they finally settled for an unsatisfying 26-yard field goal and a 24-20 deficit. Owens soon got behind the Giants’ pass defense again, and Romo found him with an easy 50-yard touchdown lob for a 31-20 lead with 10:43 left in the game. The Giants were put back in their place: second place in the N.F.C. East, tucked for now into a wild-card playoff spot, headed to Detroit for a game Sunday against the Lions (6-3). Romo, in outplaying Manning, matched his Week 1 output with four touchdown passes. He completed 20 of 28 throws for 247 yards. Manning was 23 of 34 for 236 yards, and was sacked five times. Tight end Jeremy Shockey caught a career-high 12 passes, including an 8-yard touchdown that tied the score midway through the first quarter. In the season opener, Manning had four touchdown passes, three of them to receiver Plaxico Burress. But Burress was held to four catches for 24 yards. For 29 minutes 33 seconds, the Giants held the Cowboys to 10 points, a pace short of the 33 points the Cowboys had averaged in their first eight games. The Cowboys took a 17-14 lead with 27 seconds left in the half, with Romo skipping the team downfield with a series of short completions. From the 20-yard line, with the Giants blitzing, Romo threw quickly across the middle to Patrick Crayton, who slipped through the attempted tackle of Aaron Ross and past Kevin Dockery for the score. The Giants looked ready to head to halftime trailing, handing off to Jacobs for no gain. But a 15-yard taunting penalty on Cowboys linebacker Kevin Burnett made the Giants rethink the strategy, and Manning threw a 29-yard pass to Shockey, who stepped out of bounds with six seconds left. Lawrence Tynes kicked a 40-yard field goal to tie the score. There was hope that the Giants would go on to tie the Cowboys in the standings, too. It would disappear in the second half, along with most of the discouraged fans. By the time the game ended, it all felt a little like the Giants were back where they started. EXTRA POINTS Right tackle Kareem McKenzie left the game early in the third quarter with bruised back, but returned in the fourth quarter. ... Tony Romo has thrown 8 of the 16 passing touchdowns the Giants have allowed. ...Cornerback Corey Webster was not active for the game, although he is not believed to have an injury. Webster started for the Giants in the Week 1 game against the Cowboys, but has slowly been squeezed from the lineup since with the emergence of the rookie Aaron Ross.
Giants Saddle Up but Don’t Measure Up
For six consecutive games, all of them victories, the Giants set out to prove that the start of their season was an aberration. Yet all those Sundays removed from a humiliating opening-day defeat to the Cowboys in Texas, the Giants squandered a second chance to make a strong impression and recast themselves as true title contenders. It looked like the start of the season, after all. On a cool evening in November, the Giants were undone by an eerily similar game to the one they lost on a warm night in September. They allowed a pair of long touchdown passes from Tony Romo to Terrell Owens in the second half and fell to the Cowboys, 31-20. The Giants (6-3) will probably play the final seven games for a wild-card entry into the postseason. They are two games behind the Cowboys (8-1) in the National Football Conference East, but the deficit is actually three because the Cowboys hold the tie breaker over the Giants by virtue of sweeping the season series. “You focus on winning football games, and when you get to the playoffs, anything can happen,” defensive end Michael Strahan said. “And who knows? Maybe we go to the playoffs and we play those guys again, and you have another shot at it.” When the Giants lost to the Cowboys, 45-35, in the season opener, and then to the Packers, 35-13, in the second game, there was reason to wonder if they were any good at all. Now the Giants know where they stand: firmly in the playoff hunt, but far behind the Cowboys and the Packers, who have identical records atop the N.F.C. They play each other in Dallas on Nov. 29. After the game, the Giants framed the loss in optimism. They pointed to their overall record and the resiliency it represents, and suggested that Sunday’s result stemmed from their mistakes as much as superlative play by the Cowboys. “I’m disappointed,” said Giants Coach Tom Coughlin, who called his team its “own worst enemy” against the Cowboys. “But I think we have a good football team,” he said. But on the way to the final score, the Giants revealed their inadequacies: a solid but susceptible defense unlikely to carry the franchise’s championship aspirations, and an inconsistent offensive attack that cannot keep up with the Cowboys. The Giants won six in a row largely because they allowed a league-best 13.2 points a game during the winning stretch. But the victories came against some of the N.F.L.’s weakest teams; the Giants’ previous four opponents have a combined 6-29 record. The Giants were bent on proving that though the winning streak might have been paved with patsies, it was not performed with mirrors. The score was tied at halftime, 17-17, but the Cowboys regained the lead on a drive that only teased the Giants’ hopes and fueled their regrets. Three times the defense forced a third down. Three times fans rose and spiritedly waved small white towels they were handed when they arrived, imploring the Giants to make a stop. Three times, the Cowboys made the first down, and the fans quieted and sat. Immediately after the third conversion, Romo lofted a perfect pass to Owens for a 25-yard touchdown. The tease continued on the kickoff. Ahmad Bradshaw burst past most of the Cowboys — and a yellow penalty flag flying the other way. Bradshaw was finally pushed out of bounds at the Cowboys’ 2-yard line, but the play was undone by a holding call on the rookie Kevin Boss. “I was just hoping it wasn’t to me,” Boss said of the flag thrown his direction. “Then I saw Ahmad down the sideline, and my heart kind of sank.” Rather than being 2 yards from tying the score, the Giants were 83 yards away, at their 17-yard line. They gamely tried taking the long road, even waiting until third down to make the biggest plays, including a 23-yard completion to Amani Toomer on third-and-10 near midfield. But as running back Brandon Jacobs crossed the goal line for what was cheered as a tying, 6-yard touchdown, a penalty flag flew from the hand of the referee Jeff Triplette. He called guard Chris Snee for holding, reversing the play and the game’s momentum with 14 minutes 9 seconds left. “It didn’t even come into my mind that it would have been me,” said Snee, who was pulling to the left and pushed aside safety Roy Williams, allowing Jacobs to run through a hole behind. “I was surprised and angry. I don’t know what else to say. If I gave him any doubt, then I guess it must have been on me.” The Giants followed with a delay of game penalty, one of seven penalties in the second half. Unraveled, they finally settled for an unsatisfying 26-yard field goal and a 24-20 deficit. Owens soon got behind the Giants’ pass defense again, and Romo found him with an easy 50-yard touchdown lob for a 31-20 lead with 10:43 left in the game. The Giants were put back in their place: second place in the N.F.C. East, tucked for now into a wild-card playoff spot, headed to Detroit for a game Sunday against the Lions (6-3). Romo, in outplaying Manning, matched his Week 1 output with four touchdown passes. He completed 20 of 28 throws for 247 yards. Manning was 23 of 34 for 236 yards, and was sacked five times. Tight end Jeremy Shockey caught a career-high 12 passes, including an 8-yard touchdown that tied the score midway through the first quarter. In the season opener, Manning had four touchdown passes, three of them to receiver Plaxico Burress. But Burress was held to four catches for 24 yards. For 29 minutes 33 seconds, the Giants held the Cowboys to 10 points, a pace short of the 33 points the Cowboys had averaged in their first eight games. The Cowboys took a 17-14 lead with 27 seconds left in the half, with Romo skipping the team downfield with a series of short completions. From the 20-yard line, with the Giants blitzing, Romo threw quickly across the middle to Patrick Crayton, who slipped through the attempted tackle of Aaron Ross and past Kevin Dockery for the score. The Giants looked ready to head to halftime trailing, handing off to Jacobs for no gain. But a 15-yard taunting penalty on Cowboys linebacker Kevin Burnett made the Giants rethink the strategy, and Manning threw a 29-yard pass to Shockey, who stepped out of bounds with six seconds left. Lawrence Tynes kicked a 40-yard field goal to tie the score. There was hope that the Giants would go on to tie the Cowboys in the standings, too. It would disappear in the second half, along with most of the discouraged fans. By the time the game ended, it all felt a little like the Giants were back where they started. EXTRA POINTS Right tackle Kareem McKenzie left the game early in the third quarter with bruised back, but returned in the fourth quarter. ... Tony Romo has thrown 8 of the 16 passing touchdowns the Giants have allowed. ...Cornerback Corey Webster was not active for the game, although he is not believed to have an injury. Webster started for the Giants in the Week 1 game against the Cowboys, but has slowly been squeezed from the lineup since with the emergence of the rookie Aaron Ross.
