It was a bad afternoon for the New York Giants and Russell Wilson. His overtime blunders left Giants fans shaking their heads. But he wasn’t alone in blame, and here are the Giants most to blame for the dramatic Week 2 loss to the Cowboys.
Brandon Aubrey kicked a 46-yard field goal as time expired in overtime — after a 64-yarder at the end of regulation — to lift the Cowboys to the 40-37 victory.
The loss left the Giants with a 0-2 record, both within the division and likely sending the team toward another poor season.
Giants QB Russell Wilson flopped in OT
First, let’s be fair. Wilson had one of the better games in his career before overtime. Wilson was 30 of 41 while finishing with the second-most passing yards of his 14-year career.
And his dramatic 48-yard scoring strike to Malik Nabers with 25 seconds left in regulation was a thing of beauty. Wilson deserves a lot of credit for putting the Giants in a position to win. He said he enjoyed the challenge, according to ESPN.
“I love watching boxing,” Wilson said. “We’re in a 17-round fight. And we battled the first round and second round, and got more to do. So I was really proud to be able to answer the way that we did. I’ve been part of a lot of crazy games. I don’t know if I've been a part of one that crazy and that much grit.”
However, Wilson coughed it up in overtime. His backwards pass attempt cost the Giants on one drive. And then his second-down throw-it-up-for-grabs interception led directly to the loss. Brian Daboll said Wilson played very well, according to a post on X by Giants Nation Show via NBC Sports, but …
“I thought he played well, made some plays, attacked certain things we wanted to attack,” Daboll said. “That second-and-3, it kind of slipped out of his hand. And it pushed us back there.
Of the interception, Daboll was circumspect, calling “that deep shot kind of at the end, the communication, not a bad communication, just communication. Again, this one’s tough.”
Bottom line, Wilson isn’t the winner he used to be. His career record from 2012-20 was 98-45. Over the five seasons, his mark is 23-34.
HC Brian Daboll hasn’t coached discipline
The Giants totaled 14 penalties for 160 yards. How bad was that historically? The total yardage ranked as their most since getting 175 against a team called the Boston Yankees in 1947. Yes, Boston Yankees.
And Daboll doesn’t have the right guys leading the defense, which is something he has to take responsibility for. The Giants basically handed Dallas the 20 yards they needed with 14 seconds left in regulation to get in field goal range.
Daboll said after the game what he should have said to defensive coordinator Shane Bowen before the play, according to amny.com.
“Got to play tight coverage,” Daboll said. “Got to do some things rush-wise. Made some good plays. They just made one more play than we did.”
Cowboys QB Dak Prescott made the relatively easy connection to Jake Ferguson. That led to Aubrey’s field goal after a running play gained a few yards.
Overall, Bowen’s defense was crushed for 478 yards.
Giants' secondary played poorly
It’s one thing to have a bad game. But the Giants’ secondary didn’t have any answers. Despite getting a fairly good pass rush on Prescott, the secondary had no answers for the Dallas passing game.
To be fair, all defenses will have trouble with the Dallas offense. Having CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens makes the Cowboys a very tough team to defend.
But in this game, the Giants’ secondary only needed to make one or two plays at key times to secure the win. Then all of the negatives would have been pushed aside further down the road. However, the Giants couldn’t even produce one big play to turn the outcome in their favor.
Daboll said the final score wasn’t easy to accept, according to the Giants' YouTube page via The Sporting News.
“That was a tough one,” Daboll said. “Battle back and forth, guys left it all out on the field, tough result.”
Making matters worse, the Giants must take on the Kansas City Chiefs and Patrick Mahomes in Week 3. Plus, the Chiefs will be desperate to avoid a 0-3 start that could end their run of AFC dominance. It's a bad situation for the Giants, who will be a solid underdog while also trying to avoid a 0-3 beginning.
Wilson can't afford to play part of the game. He will need to be at his level best. If the team's record gets too bad, too quickly, it will make sense for the Giants to bench Wilson and give rookie Jaxon Dart a long look.
