Giants 17 – Bucs 3
First of all, that wasn’t merely wind down there yesterday on the Giants Stadium field.
The orange streamers affixed to the top of the bright yellow goal posts spent the afternoon flying horizontally and any football that dared to get launched airborne risked getting repelled in an unanticipated direction.
“Without a doubt it was the worst wind game,” Tiki Barber said, thinking back on 10 years of a career spent working at the Meadowlands.
“You look at the goal posts, you can see them waving around, it almost looked like they were going to come down,” added center Shaun O’Hara.
It was apparent from the outset this would not be business as usual for the Giants and Buccaneers, that aesthetics and offensive pyrotechnics would play no part in a game played with steady 20 mile-and-hour winds that at any moment erupted in gusts over 40 mph. This would be more about survival, about not screwing up.
“We knew it would not be pretty,” O’Hara said.
There were no complaints coming from the Giants, not after they did not commit a turnover, grabbed an early lead and for 60 minutes sent their surging defense out to maul an overmatched rookie quarterback and a weak Buccaneers offense. The result was a 17-3 victory that allowed the Giants (5-2) to add to their first-place hold in the NFC East after winning their fourth straight game.
Beauty can be measured in different ways. The Giants scored one touchdown with the wind (Plaxico Burress’ brilliant one-handed catch), one going into the wind (Brandon Jacobs 1-yard run) and nearly pitched a shutout against Bruce Gradkowski and the Bucs (2-5).
“I didn’t think it was ugly,” linebacker Antonio Pierce said.
As for Tiki Barber facing brother Ronde for the last time, the many family and friends watching the identical twins did not see greatness from either player. Everyone knew passing at times would be near-impossible and the Bucs brought eight and nine men to the line to deal with Tiki. It worked. Tiki, who will retire after this season, ran into the teeth of the Tampa Bay defense, rushing 26 times for only 68 yards.
“I said you guys did what a lot of defenses can’t do . . . stop me,” Tiki told Ronde afterward.
Ronde, Tampa’s Pro Bowl cornerback, endured a rough first half. Eli Manning, playing in his first real wind game, tossed a first-quarter lob from his 7-yard line that floated into the left corner of the end zone, where Burress and Ronde Barber were isolated. The ball looked as if it would sail out of bounds, but the 6-5 Burress stuck his long left arm into the air and somehow made a one-handed grab, rising way above the smaller Barber for the touchdown.
“I thought I was in pretty decent position,” Ronde said, “but 6-foot-5 and 5-feet-9 ½ is not a battle that I am going to win very often.”
The Giants made it 14-0 after a fumble by Gradkowski – an ineffective Cadillac Williams (20 rushing yards) dropped the pitch-out – was recovered by Fred Robbins on the Tampa 28. Ronde was victimized again, this time on a stop-and-go route by Burress. Barber bit hard on Manning’s pump fake, bursting in as Burress sped by him and then slowed to haul in a pass batted back by the wind for a 25-yard gain. Two plays later, Jacobs powered in.
Manning’s 16 completions went for only 154 yards but he took care of the ball.
“One of those days where you had to just tough it out,” he said.
One of those days that featured 18 punts and three points in a tedious second half.
“Every game is not gonna be a Cinderella story and go along just the way you like it,” O’Hara said. “You’re gonna have some games where you’re just grinding it out and you’re relying on your defense to win games. If you want to be a great team you’ve got to mature and come out with a victory in games like this.”