The Giants went into their bye off a tough loss to a Seattle team they’re now fighting for playoff position with, but Saquon Barkley looked at the bright side after that day by saying that 6-2 at the midpoint was pretty good.
The time since hasn’t been, though, as they beat the now 1-11-1 Texans off the bye, and wee 7-2 knowing their stretch run included a hot Lions squad, five divisional games (including one in Dallas on a short week for Thanksgiving), and the NFC’s second-best team in Minnesota.
That team had high playoff hopes, but now 0-3-1 into that stretch after Sunday’s drubbing at the hands of the Eagles, the Giants found themselves, at least for the moment, out of the playoffs, their 7-5-1 record moving the similarly-marked Commanders into the seventh seed based on tiebreakers.
“The Eagles played great, and we got our ass beat,” a somber Saquon Barkley said after the loss.
Added Kayvon Thibodeaux: “Definitely (humbling). When you take a loss like this, you have to look at yourself in the mirror and figure out what you got to do to get better.”
Big Blue’s two pre-bye losses came five weeks apart, but in the last four, they’re now 0-3-1, and their rematch with the Commanders – whom they played to a 20-20 tie on Dec. 4 – now has gone from division rival to potential playoff game.
“We’ve got to win this f-ing game,” a blunt Jihad Ward said after Sunday’s loss, in perhaps the understatement of the century.
“We have to be very honest about what it is we didn’t do well today, but at the same time, we have to correct it and move forward, understand no one will feel sorry for us and it’s up to us to fix it,” added Daniel Jones. “Everything we want to achieve is still out in front of us, and I’m confident we’ll bounce back and have a great week of preparation and play well Sunday night.
Seattle’s loss to Carolina later Sunday put Big Blue back into the seventh spot heading into Week 15, but whoever wins in DC next week takes the head-to-head tiebreaker, and with the surging Lions now 6-7, there are four teams within 1 ½ games of the final playoff spots behind the division leaders and Dallas.
And the Giants all believe they still deserve to be there.
“Yeah, without a doubt,” Julian Love said when asked if he still thinks the Giants are a playoff team. “Listen, I haven't been in this position, we haven’t been in this position with four games left to control our destiny, and that juice and energy has remained in the building, which is great. We're not depleted there. We got to shake this one off. But we have four games in front of us, starting with this next one against Washington, which is what you want. When you grow up, as a kid, you want games that are 'everything's on the line.' So, that's how we're treating it.”
Added Jones: “It’s exciting. There are a lot of guys who haven’t experienced this, so that hunger and the opportunity in front of us to get to the playoffs and play meaningful games down the stretch is an awesome one.
Everyone is excited, but we have to get ready to play our best game on Sunday night.”
We can leave it to Saquon Barkley to explain why:
“We have talent in the locker room. We put ourselves in a really good position to play meaningful football in December and everything we want is still in front of us. We've got a big one coming this week and we've just got to focus on that,” he said. “(Philly) whipped our ass today, but the reason why I believe is because I know the talent and I know the men we have in our locker room and I know the hard work that they put in, the prep that we put in; we're not playing well and that's on us, but we've shown what we can do. We played against some really good teams early in the season and we beat some really good teams and that's the reason why we're in this position to be able to put ourselves in the tournament, put ourselves in the playoffs and play meaningful games in December. If we weren't talented and we weren't a good team, you know we wouldn't be in this situation and we are. So now we've got to double down, continue to believe in each other and it starts with all of us. It starts with myself, it starts with the leaders, and get ready to come out this week and get ready for a big game.”
As Barkley, Jones, and others noted, the Giants still control their own destiny, as they are a playoff team as of now and will remain that way if they can win out. That’s all you can ask for – just ask those who were on the 2020 team that had to put their division title hopes in the hands of the Eagles – and now is the time when desire is just as important as execution.
“It’s December football, it’s about who wants it more. There’s more to it than knowing the playbook and doing your job; it’s about how bad do you want it?” Ward said in a quote that was edited to remove several expletives. “Nobody will sit here and give it to us, so it’s how bad do you really, really want it? You gotta come with it, and not sit back and just wait ‘til next year.”
“It's just kind of keeping that same commitment to the grind. As the season goes on, you coast and you get comfortable. So now, it's just getting back to what we know and getting back to the six pack, to the things that got us here,” added Thibodeaux.
So what will we see on Sunday night? Let’s give the last word on that to the head coach who has stressed the “1-0 every week” mentality since day one:
“It’s hard to remain consistent after poor results, but we’ve stressed since Day 1 that you have to play well and coach well every week. Losing sucks, because you put a lot into it, but the season’s winding down, and we have an important one on Sunday. That’s where our focus is, so we’ll think about this one tonight, move on, and do the things we need to do tomorrow to get ready to play Washington.”
Follow Lou DiPietro on Twitter: @LouDiPietroWFAN
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