Not everything about the Giants is different this year.
The goodwill gained during a rare and surprising two-game season-opening winning streak made it feel like anything was possible — and Saquon Barkley’s go-ahead mad dash to the end zone in the third quarter Monday only increased those good vibes. But the Giants still struggled against one of their chief rivals, still lost under the lights and still have major concerns on the offensive line.
Daniel Jones ran for his life, but the Cowboys ran away with the second half by scoring 17 consecutive points to turn a third-quarter touchdown deficit into a two-score lead and beat the Giants, 23-16, in an old-fashioned slog at MetLife Stadium. The Giants have lost 11 straight prime-time games and 13 of their past 15 meetings against the Cowboys, who celebrated the win with enough smack talk that the teams had to be separated after the final whistle.
“[Daniel] put his body on the line and it’s on the rest of us to help him,” center Jon Feliciano said. “He went out there and played his balls off and we’ve got to have his back.”
For most of the first three quarters, the Giants’ best offensive play was Jones dropping back and scrambling out of a collapsed pocket. It was a dangerous formula to rely on as the game went on, and Jones began flirting with intentional grounding penalties and careless ball security.
Nobody could’ve pictured what catastrophe looked like, however. Jones threw a game-sealing interception with a chance to drive the offense 91 yards in 105 seconds with no timeouts because David Sills slipped on the route.
“Something that can’t happen. Can’t let the offense down like that,” Sills said. “Can’t let down No. 8 like that.”
Away from the throw, Sterling Shepard suffered a serious non-contact knee injury that required postgame X-rays and is thought to be a season-ender.
“I just feel terrible for the guy,” head coach Brian Daboll said.
The difference in the game came at the line of scrimmage, where the Cowboys sacked Jones five times among 12 quarterback hits. The Giants managed just two hits on Cooper Rush, a former Giant for a whole 147 days in 2020 and an injury replacement for Dak Prescott.
Demarcus Lawrence, who has made a career out of backing up smack talk against Giants quarterbacks and offensive lines, had three sacks in the first 32 minutes of the game by beating rookie right tackle Evan Neal the same way he used to beat Ereck Flowers and the other tackles tried in between. Lawrence taunted Jones by calling him “Little Eli” Manning last week.
The Giants took exception to rookie tight end Peyton Hendershot leading the postgame trash talk, which surely will fuel the rematch later this season.
“He was talking crazy on the field,” Giants outside linebacker Jihad Ward said. “We tried to push him back to the tunnel. I’m going to let you have it. Laugh now, cry later.”
Rush made his big throws on a tie-breaking touchdown drive, when he connected four times for 48 yards with CeeDee Lamb, who atoned for two earlier drops when the white-towel-waving home “Whiteout” crowd was at its loudest.
When it looked like none of Lamb’s catches would be bigger than the reception right at the sticks to convert a fourth-and-4 and pay dividends for eschewing a 58-yard field goal attempt, he found the end zone. The Cowboys wisely hurried to the line of scrimmage to keep the Giants from challenging the officials’ spot — television replays showed it would’ve been a close call — and kept the momentum going.
Lamb made a one-handed catch of a fade pass over tightly positioned Adoree’ Jackson to give the Cowboys a 20-13 lead in the middle of their three straight scoring drives.
“Hell of a throw, great catch by CeeDee,” Jackson said. “Just take your hat off.”
The Giants had two old reliables: The leg of Graham Gano, who converted field goals from 42, 51 and 51 yards, and the power-speed-vision package of Barkley. But Barkley’s 36-yard touchdown run was answered by Ezekiel Elliott’s 1-yard run at the end of a 75-yard drive to tie the score at 13-13 just before the end of the third quarter.
Both teams went two of three on field goals in the first 36 minutes to account for all the scoring. Gano had a 47-yarder blocked — just his second miss on his first 52 attempts inside 50 yards since the start of the 2020 season — and the Cowboys’ Brett Maher missed a 59-yarder wide left on the final play of the first half.
