The Giants were down 24-20 with about three minutes left of their Week 6 game when they finally secured their first interception of the season, safety Julian Love picking off Lamar Jackson on what looked like a busted play from the beginning.
It was a play more than one Giants defender was not surprised Jackson tried to make, but were surprised it ended up with a pass over the middle.
“Honestly, the way it went up in the air it kind of did seem like he was throwing it away because he kind of just threw it off his back foot,” said Leonard Williams. “It looked like it was about to go out of bounds, and it went down the middle of the field.”
“Those plays are really dangerous because you have the most dynamic quarterback back there. It was a bobbled snap, but as soon as he got it, you could see his eyes were looking down field,” added Julian Love. “That's when he's made his great plays in his career. I wasn't covering, whoever he tried to throw it to. I was kind of just baiting him; I saw someone wide open, saw Lamar kind of lock-in, and then I baited the throw a little bit, and thankfully I made the play in a critical situation.”
Williams wasn’t surprised Jackson tried it because it was crunch time, and he sees Jackson as “a big-time key on their offense and those type of guys want the ball in their hands when it's a clutch situation.”
Related
Love saved the ball, saying “when you pick off a future Hall of Fame quarterback, you have to keep it tight,” and that will go next to one he has from intercepting Patrick Mahomes.
But his INT was only one of two huge Giants defensive plays in the final three minutes, as Kayvon Thibodeaux got a strip sack of Jackson on the next drive that ended up salting away the game.
“Wink has said for weeks that once we get a turnover and once, we start creating turnovers, they're going to come in bunches. That stuff is contagious. I made a play on the previous drive, and you see our team just make a play immediately right after that,” Love said. “That's how football works; it's a game of momentum, it's a game of building off of each other, and this team has done such a great job of doing it across all sides of the ball; offense, defense, and special teams capitalizing on each other. That's what that was; the epitome of what that was for us.”
Just more evidence of the Giants’ never quit mentality, even after they were down all day and down 20-10 midway through the fourth.
Related
“That's a critical situation in a game. If you're down 20-10, things can go either way at that point. You can either go 'Alright, we'll chalk it up', or you can fight, and this team has some individuals on the sidelines who were just fired up and just stayed positive because that's the game,” Love said. “One touchdown by your offense makes it a whole new game. Going into that, we knew we had some juice, and we knew we had an opportunity in front of us to at least hold them to three points instead of getting a touchdown. I got the interception, and to create an opportunity like that, that's when the momentum is just completely flipped.”
Thanks in part to the raucous crowd at MetLife that also never quit on Big Blue.
“The stadium was rocking; somebody said that they had never heard the stadium so loud before after the pick and I couldn't tell because I partially blacked out from the moment [of the interception] of just the excitement of it all,” Love smiled. “Those situations are critical.”
And, just another showcase of not the worst 5-1 team in the NFL, for sure, but maybe the most resilient.
“I think Coach Daboll has done a great job of really building on what we have in front of us. We're a team that might not win the game 40-0; we're a team that will bring our team into the fourth quarter and make key plays in key situations to win games,” Love said. “That's who we are; we're resilient, so thankfully made out with this game that against a really good team.”
Follow Lou DiPietro on Twitter: @LouDiPietroWFAN
Listen live to WFAN via:
Audacy App | Online Stream | Smart Speaker
Follow WFAN on Social Media:
Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | YouTube | Twitch