Cowboys roll past uninspiring Giants, sack Manning six times
The New York Giants are officially in trouble.
Yes, the Giants have two of the NFL’s marquee players of 2018 in Saquon Barkley and Odell Beckham Jr. Unfortunately, they’re led by a marquee player of 2008, with a game plan from 1978. The end result: a 20-13 loss at the hands of the Dallas Cowboys, a seven-point loss that looked so much worse.
Eli Manning took an astounding six sacks from six different Cowboys. Beckham was rendered irrelevant, catching only four passes for 51 yards. Barkley did all he could, picking up 79 yards receiving and only 28 rushing, but he gathered most of his yardage in tiny handfuls.
Dallas didn’t have to be great to beat New York, and the Cowboys weren’t. But Dallas did enough to show that there’s at least a pulse there. For New York, it’s going to get worse before it gets better.
First half: Coming up Cowboys
The Cowboys probably didn’t engineer their first drive with the intent of shutting down their critics, but they began this key divisional matchup with as much of a statement drive as you can make. You say Dak Prescott’s too conservative? He used play-fakes and shifting receivers to set up the touchdown. You say Dallas plays too tentative? Tavon Austin broke long to score on a 64-yard broken-field touchdown pass. You say the Cowboys are too plodding? Dallas scored in just 94 seconds. And just like that, Manning and the Giants were starting from behind.
The Giants, playing classically conservative-coach football, opted on their first drive to punt at midfield on fourth-and-inches, despite the fact they have, you know, the No. 2 overall draft pick in the backfield behind Manning. The Cowboys flipped that unnecessary gift into three more points courtesy of new kicker Brett Maher, and the Giants never got any closer.
New York didn’t accomplish much beyond getting Manning thrown around like dirty laundry in the backfield for the rest of the half. And the worst was yet to come.
Second half: Dallas tightens the vise
Manning spent much of the game dodging the rush, and at his advanced age, that’s no easy task. But the Cowboys were relentless, and on the fifth play of the second half stripped Manning on a sack. Dallas converted that into three more points.
About halfway through the third quarter, New York began its longest sustained drive, keyed by a 37-yard pass to Cody Latimer. Barkley rumbled down to the shadow of the goal line with a brilliant, video-game-level stunt:
Barkley would finish the game with a combined 107 yards, and that was his finest play of the night. So, with first-and-goal at the Cowboys’ 3, the Giants appeared poised to cut the Dallas lead in half. But the Giants offense stalled, Manning couldn’t find any of his stud talent open, and Dallas dropped a hammer on New York’s drive. Aldrick Rosas converted on a field goal that felt like a failure.
Over on the Dallas side of the ball, the Cowboys had trouble following up that sterling first drive. Penalties killed drive after drive, and the Cowboys had to settle into a thump-and-dink offense that lulled the AT&T Stadium crowd into an uneasy mutter.
But give the Cowboys credit: They tightened the vise when they needed to. Prescott began the fourth quarter by engineering a 14-play, 82-yard, 8 1/2-minute touchdown drive that put Dallas up 17 points and effectively ended the game.
New York showed the tiniest bit of a heartbeat, scoring with 1:27 remaining in the game when Manning found an absolutely wide-open Evan Engram in the end zone courtesy of an indifferent Dallas defense. The Giants recovered the onside kick and later converted a field goal, but couldn’t pull off a second onside kick with 11 seconds left.
Where do both teams go from here?
New York has plenty of questions awaiting; at 0-2 it’s flailing and looking overmatched. Next up for the Giants is Houston, which doesn’t bode well for Manning’s prospects for staying upright. Dallas, meanwhile, sits in a three-way tie for first in the NFC East, though the Cowboys seem in a completely different echelon than the Philadelphia Eagles. Dallas draws Seattle on the road next week.
Neither one of these teams is going to scare anyone anytime soon. But if you’re looking to wager on which team will go further, look to Dallas. New York has too many problems in too many places.
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter or on Facebook.
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