'Inconceivable': How the NY Giants inexplicably found a way to give Jets miracle victory

EAST RUTHERFORD - Once the Giants got a lead Sunday, Brian Daboll was determined to play to the strength of his defense and run the football with Saquon Barkley.

No matter how conservative that may have been, Daboll believed it was the way to go.

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Especially against the Jets, whose defense could turn any game against any opponent on a dime.

And not with the way Big Blue was swarming Zach Wilson, the opposing quarterback, just like it did Sam Howell and Washington the previous week on their way to a triumph.

Daboll did not want his undrafted rookie quarterback, Tommy DeVito, to make a mistake and cost the Giants the game.

The Giants came within 28 seconds of that game plan producing a victory.

According to ESPN, they had a 99.7 percent chance to win.

They did not.

From playing smart to playing scared in a matter of four seconds as Graham Gano's 35-yard field goal sailed wide left, leaving a miracle finish there for the taking by the Jets.

And in the most stunning of ways, the Giants let them do it, too, losing in incredulous fashion as the Jets forced overtime with a field goal as time expired, then completed the comeback with another field goal for the game-winner at the 6:09 mark of the extra session.

Jets 13, Giants 10.

"Stings," said Giants running back Saquon Barkley, who rushed a career-high 36 times for 128 yards. What he would've given for one more attempt on that fourth-and-1 in the waning moments, only to have the Giants send out Gano with the opportunity to force the Jets into a touchdown-or-bust scenario with no timeouts, likely the full 75 yards following a touchback.

Instead, Gano missed his second kick of the game and third in the last two weeks.

Gano took responsibility for the loss after missing two kicks, speaking in a somber tone at his locker following the game. He refused to blame an injury to his left knee that he's been kicking through, one he told NorthJersey.com prior to the game that he will eventually need surgery to fix.

"It's on me," said Gano, one of the most accurate kickers in the NFL coming into the season with a better than 90 percent accuracy. He has made 71.4 percent this season. "I'm sure some people want me to come here and make excuses. I've got none."

For the second time in three weeks, the Giants were left searching for answers to how they lost a game they had every right to believe they should have won. In Buffalo, a prime time upset over the Bills fell short on the game's final play when a Tyrod Taylor-to-Darren Waller pass went incomplete in the end zone, with no penalty for defensive pass interference called despite a defender having a fist full of Waller's jersey.

That was disappointing enough.

This, however, took devastation to another level entirely.

This was against the Jets (4-3), and down to their third quarterback, DeVito, who was elevated from the practice squad for the third week in a row to back up Taylor, who left with a ribs injury. Not only that, Taylor left the stadium and spent much of the afternoon at a local hospital undergoing further evaluation.

Had the Giants prevailed, they would have their first winning streak of the season heading to Las Vegas, where they would face another opponent in a similar competitive bracket, if you will, and a better than puncher's chance at further digging out of an early 1-5 hole.

None of that happened, of course, and the Giants are now saddled with a 2-6 record, essentially at the season's halfway point, instead. There remains some uncertainty as to whether Daniel Jones will return this week with clearance for contact in time to play the Raiders. Taylor's status is in jeopardy - at least for the moment - and DeVito, while he was gutsy in his professional debut, was certainly not put in position to play quarterback from an all-around perspective. DeVito did not attempt a pass in regulation.

Still, even after Gano missed the second field goal at the end of regulation, the Jets and Zach Wilson had to drive the football down the field to earn the chance they eventually got. He connected with Garrett Wilson and then Allen Lazard for a pair of 29-yard plays, and the Jets hustled to the line and spiked the ball with one second left on the clock.

Greg Zuerlein booted the first of his two field goals from 35 yards out to force overtime. Then, after the Giants went three and out, Zach Wilson went fishing for a prayer on the next series on third-and-5, and Adoree' Jackson obliged, interfering with wide receiver Malik Taylor on a deep shot that set up Zuerlein's game-winner from 33 yards out.

"You’ve just got to finish. NFL is a game of finishing," Giants outside linebacker Kayvon Thibodeaux said. "And they were able to execute at the end of the game and get enough points to win."

Sounds simple, but that was a reality that never should have come to fruition. Thibodeaux's third sack of the game with 1:26 left in regulation forced a turnover on downs for the Jets, giving possession to the Giants' offense at the 26-yard line.

The game, for all intents and purposes, was over. The Giants were celebrating on the sideline.

The plan seemed routine enough: give the ball to Barkley and run out the clock. He ran for 6 yards, then 1 yard and 2 yards, forcing the Jets to use all of their timeouts.

"It’s 4th-and-1, I could sit here and be like, 'Oh I want the ball in that situation,' but we’ve got nothing but trust in Graham, and we’re going to continue to have trust in Graham," Barkley said. "To be honest, I could have gotten the first down the play before [on third down]. I’ve got to drive my feet a little more, or some other back could find a way to get a first down. You could sit here and pick and choose, oh the 4th-and-1, that decision or what should we have done there or not, and you could make that the play. But there are so many plays that go throughout a game that helps with the decision of how the game turns out. Just got to be better, all of us."

By game's end, the ending could not have been any worse for the Giants.

"I mean, I told the guys at halftime we're going through 26 (Barkley). We’re going to hand it off a bunch, we’re going to play good defense, we’re going to try to control the field position with our kicking game," Daboll said. "Just kind of play it a certain way to try to win the game, and it just didn’t work out."

The sting for the Giants is going to hurt for a while after this one. Now they'll have to deal with the idea that any chance to save this season came crashing down in those unforgettable 28 seconds.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: How NY Giants found a way to gift Jets a miracle victory