Giants-Eagles highlights: 5 plays that led to Giants’ lopsided loss

Here are sequences of plays that made a difference on Sunday

The New York Giants suffered an all-too familiar feeling as they were destroyed at home by the Philadelphia Eagles, 28-3, on Sunday. Former Giants running back Saquon Barkley rushed for 176 yards with a touchdown as the Giants’ offense gained just 119 total yards on the day.

The Giants defense kept the team in the game until the second half. They sacked Jalen Hurts five times and the Eagles’ offense couldn’t muster much other than a few crucial plays in the first half. Here are my halftime notes from the game:

Josh Ezeudu struggled early in the game, but the eight sacks surrendered by the Giants’ protection were not all Ezeudu’s fault. The pass protection has regressed over the last two weeks.

The Giants’ offense remained inept and ineffective at home. Daniel Jones was benched at the start of the fourth quarter for Drew Lock, who completed three of eight passes for six yards. This is, yet another, demoralizing loss in the Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll era. Here’s five plays, or five sequence of plays, that led to the loss.

Play(s) 1: John Mara’s insomnia

Barkley was ready for this matchup. The Giants defense held him relatively in check for the first three drives, but there were plays that didn’t pop on the stat-sheet that suggested his time would come:

The Giants and Eagles traded punts until Barkley sparked the first scoring drive of the game:

The Eagles ran shotgun boundary power with center Cam Jurgens leading the way around the down block of Azeez Ojulari. Barkley picked up 55 yards on the run. The very next play was a 12-yard run to the same side by Kenneth Gainwell. These runs set up Barkley’s touchdown. Barkley could have realistically had three touchdowns, as Hurts punched in two tush-pushes.

Barkley didn’t stop in the second half, albeit he wasn’t needed much after the Eagles’ took a 28-3 lead. Here was a 41-yard run up the gut by Barkley toward the end of the third quarter:

This game could not have gone worse for Giants’ owner John Mara who famously stated this on HBO’s Hard Knocks:

Not only did Barkley have a great game, but the Giants offense did nothing…nada…ugatz. How long can this continue?

Play 2: Fourth-and-3 to Brown

After Barkley’s touchdown drive, the Giants managed a three-play, negative eight yard drive that resulted in one of Matt Haack’s 11 punts. The Giants defense stoped the Eagles on third-and-3 at their own 41-yard line. The Eagles opted to go for the fourth-down conversion, and found more:

The Eagles do a good job motioning A.J. Brown (11) outside against Nick McCloud (44). Brown ran a slight stutter and go to gain vertical leverage against McCloud, and the end result was a touchdown, Philadelphia. Grant Calcaterra (81) ran directly at the safety and sat, ensuring the one-on-one matchup outside. This gave the Eagles a 14-0 lead. The Giants were lifeless on offense, and their defense started to crack.

Play(s) 3: Hurts’ tush-push

The Eagles drove down to the goal line twice for TWO Jalen Hurts’ tush-push touchdowns. The first drive was 10 plays for 77 yards, and the second was ten plays for 92 yards. There was one fourth down conversion on the 77 yard touchdown drive and one third down conversion on the 92 yard drive. Both drives took place in the second half.

Play 4: Touchdown nullified

The Giants’ offense took a feeble breath at the end of the first half. They went on a 10-play, 39-yard drive that ended in 3 points. Before the field goal, Daniel Jones connected with Theo Johnson for a third-and-4 touchdown that was nullified by Johnson’s offensive pass interference:

Johnson did extend and shove at the top of his break, so the call was accurate. Johnson must be more subtle with these moves. New York then faced third-and-14 with no timeouts and nine seconds left. Instead of taking a shot to the end zone, Brian Daboll opted to kick the field goal and kick the ball back to Philadelphia with a few seconds left on the clock. After last week’s debacle in the red zone, Daboll didn’t want to risk leaving points on the field; it ended up being the only points scored by the Giants.

Play(s) 5: Giants’ defense showed up…

They may not have stayed long, but who could? New York harassed Hurts for five sacks, and made him uncomfortable for much of the first half. Shane Bowen ran simulated pressure to confuse Hurts and the Eagles’ protection. Brian Burns, Azeez Ojulari, Dexter Lawrence, and Tomon Fox were the beneficiaries of the sacks. Lawrence had two, and Fox’s came in garbage time. Still, at least someone in blue showed up to the game; here’s some of their sacks: