GIANT NOTES
Memo to those planning on attending Sunday’s playoff game at Giants Stadium: If you wear green, Jim Fassel will view you as the enemy.
It’s early in the week, but not too early for Fassel to sound the alarm. Consider this a call-to-arms from the coach of the Giants to the paying customers.
Fassel heard how the Eagles were inspired by their home fans at Veterans Stadium and saw how distracted the Buccaneers became in their 21-3 wild-card playoff loss. Fassel wants his home stadium to be rocking when the Giants face the Eagles, as there no longer is any cold-weather advantage now that the Rams and Bucs have been eliminated.
“It’s good to be at home, without a doubt, as I look at the league and the way the games are going,” said Fassel, acknowledging that the home teams are 4-0 thus far in the playoffs. “You heard me saying we’ll erase all the conditions about the weather and things like that. I didn’t want my team worrying about that.
“We’re playing a team and they play in the same weather conditions we play in, so that’s not going to be a factor. What will be a factor is our fans. I know there’s some tickets left, and I hope our guys grab it up and don’t let people down in Philadelphia grab them up.”
Of the 5,000 tickets set to go on sale today, Fassel wants every one of them to go to someone who will be cheering long and hard for his team.
“That’s why I’d like to see them buy up all the tickets so it’s all blue in the stadium, which hopefully it will be, and our crowd’s into it,” he said. “The sense I get is they’re going to be cranked up and ready to go. I would think they would be. All of us around here are.”
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Those 5,000 tickets for Sunday’s game go on sale today at noon. Tickets will be available only at Ticketmaster outlets in the northeast. There will be no phone sales and no sales at the Giants ticket office or the Continental Airlines Arena box office.
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The Giants and Eagles have played each other 133 times but only once in the playoffs. The lone post-season meeting came Dec. 27, 1981, with the Giants winning 27-21 at Veterans Stadium behind Rob Carpenter‘s 161 rushing yards.
Fassel yesterday made another one of his guarantees, this one involving RB Ron Dayne, his slumping rookie who has faded in the last month of the season. “I think Ron is going to need to carry quite a bit of the load,” Fassel said of the upcoming playoffs. “He will. I guarantee you Ron Dayne as we move through the playoffs is going to be an integral force and you’re going to see the type of player we all thought he was.”
Tiki Barber, a proud Virginia grad, had this reaction to Al Groh leaving the Jets to take the head coaching job at his alma mater: “They got a Jet in there, are you serious? I’m not even going back there.” Barber than paused and added, “I’m just kidding.
Fassel said he was “shocked” when he heard that Groh left the Jets. “All the things he said about why he’s taking the job make sense,” Fassel said. . . . WR Joe Jurevicius, coming off a knee injury, ran with the team yesterday and Fassel said he feels Jurevicius has perhaps a 70 percent chance of playing.