Upon further review, Tom Coughlin would do it again.
“I’m not playing for the field goal,’’ he said Monday, and then repeated himself. “I’m not playing for the field goal.’’
You get the message: Coughlin wasn’t playing for the field goal in the closing minutes of Sunday’s 27-26 loss to the unbeaten Patriots. Trailing 24-23, the Giants had the ball on the New England 5-yard line with 2:06 remaining. The Patriots had only one timeout remaining and Coughlin had to decide whether to run the ball, use as much time on the clock as possible and settle for a field goal or throw it in an attempt to go for the touchdown.
He opted to throw it, Eli Manning’s apparent TD pass to Odell Beckham Jr. was overturned and another pass and give-up sack by Manning allowed Josh Brown to kick a 29-yard field goal to put the Giants ahead 26-24, giving Tom Brady 1:47 to work with to mount the winning drive. That caused a social media clock-management frenzy.
“You’re not going to run the ball into six defensive linemen,’’ Coughlin said. “You’re trying to score. Your matchups are very good in those circumstances one-on-one. You’ve got to take advantage of what the opponent gives you. Go for it. That’s what you do.’’
Coughlin added the quality of the opposing quarterback — Tom Brady — and the long-distance kicking ability of Stephen Gostkowski made it even more imperative to score a touchdown, and throwing it was the best option against the goal-line defensive package.
“They’re saying to you, you’re not going to run, so you’re going to be throwing the football,’’ Coughlin said, “but I look at it as your matchups are all singled. So go beat somebody and score.’’
Peyton Manning suffered through a career-worst performance, and got benched in the Broncos’ 29-13 loss to the Chiefs.
“He will be fine, bounce back and hopefully get healthy,’’ younger brother Eli said. “Hey, they are 7-2 and in a good spot, I would take 7-2 with one four-interception game right now, so that is the way it goes.’’
Peyton partially tore his plantar fascia, an injury Eli is familiar with, as he suffered a fully torn plantar fascia during the 2009 season.
“Hopefully he will figure out a way to feel as good as he can and get a plan for getting back where he is moving around, being able to push off and playing the way he knows he can play,’’ Eli said.
Coughlin said Beckham approached him in the locker room and said he blamed himself for the loss for allowing CB Malcolm Butler to knock the ball loose in the end zone in the final minutes.
“You know I don’t believe that … there is no one individual that is responsible, we’re all responsible,’’ Coughlin said. “Securing the ball properly right away as the second move rather than holding the ball away from your body, he learned a difficult lesson and I’m sure it’ll stick with him.’’
CB Prince Amukamara has missed five straight games with a partially torn pectoral, but said he is “100 percent’’ sure he will play Nov. 29 vs. the Redskins coming out of the bye.
The Giants signed OT Emmett Cleary off their practice squad and waived CB Tramain Jacobs, who played on special teams the last two games.