FOXBORO -- Former Giants defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo knows a thing or two about defending Tom Brady and the Patriots offense, as he was defensive coordinator when the Giants beat the Patriots in Super Bowl XLII to spoil the undefeated season.
Appearing on Good Morning Football Saturday, Spagnuolo detailed what it takes to beat Brady and the Patriots.
"Tom likes to use the whole clock and you know that going it," Spagnuolo said. "Which means the ball's not going to be snapped until somewhere under 10 (seconds). So when we did disguise (safeties) Gibril Wilson and James Butler, they were using the clock. So Tom's waiting and our guys are waiting. I thought our guys did a nice job, because that's not an easy thing to do, if you're up toward the line of scrimmage and you're supposed to be back (deep). So they did a nice job with it. Gibril did a nice job."
In that Super Bowl, the Giants held Brady and the Patriots to just 14 points.
"Well it's funny, and (former Giants linebacker) Jessie Armstead teases me about this, but at one point in the week I said, 'It doesn't matter if we stop him from throwing it or not, let's just make sure that we hit him,'" Spagnuolo said. "And he told me this later, he said, 'That doesn't sound right.' He said, 'Coach, I'm not so sure I was on board with that.' But our guys bought into it. And the hope was we could frustrate him a little bit. That was the first thing."
Spagnuolo added: "The second thing was, let's not give up passes over 20 yards. I mean, everybody talks about that, right? And the guys did that, too. I think they had one catch for 19 and two catches each for 18 yards. So packaging those two together, our guys went out and played lights out and played inspired football and we ended up winning the game."
What can the @Eagles learn from the Giants SBXLII win versus the @Patriots? Former NYG defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo stopped by to shed some light on gameplanning for NE. pic.twitter.com/e4iqc9VIuR
— GMFB (@gmfb) January 27, 2018
