Daniel Jones ran for his life and Saquon Barkley ran for a highlight-reel landing.
But Brian Daboll’s Giants completed flat and fell to Cooper Rush and the division rival Dallas Cowboys, 23-16, on Monday Night Football for his or her first lack of the season.
They additionally misplaced veteran receiver Sterling Shepard to a non-contact left knee damage on Jones’ remaining throw of the evening: an interception to Cowboys nook Trevon Diggs after receiver David Sills had slipped on his route.
“Definitely a gut-punch ending,” a despondent Barkley stated. “It’s tough.”
Jones did all he may whereas going through constant and intense stress from the Cowboys’ cross rush. He ran for 79 yards and threw for 196 within the face of 17 quarterback pressures, 12 QB hits and 5 sacks by Dallas’ protection.
“I’ll be a little sore tomorrow, but feeling good,” Jones stated after.
But Dallas (2-1) scored 17 answered factors in a 10-minute second half stretch to beat a 13-6 Giants lead.
And the Giants (2-1) misplaced for the tenth time of their final 11 conferences with the Cowboys courting again to the beginning of the 2017 season — regardless of Jones doing all he may.
“He went out there and played his b-lls off,” heart Jon Feliciano stated of Jones, who wears quantity 8. “We’ve got to have eight′s back. I don’t think we played particularly well up front and other places that are not my job.”
Cowboys defensive finish DeMarcus Lawrence racked up three sacks of Jones in a one-sided battle with Giants rookie proper deal with Evan Neal. Shepard and Kenny Golladay dropped key fourth-quarter passes to stall the Giants’ comeback effort.
And the Cowboys ran the ball for 176 yards on a Leonard Williams-less Giants protection, led by Tony Pollard’s 105 on the bottom.
“Everyone knows we gotta help eight, especially when he’s out there doing what he’s doing: never giving up on the play, taking big hits, making plays with his legs,” Feliciano stated. “He did everything he could out there. And this loss is on us up front; not on eight.”
Daboll’s workforce will look to rebound subsequent Sunday of their third straight house sport in opposition to the Chicago Bears (2-1). They’ll want to start out quicker, although.
The Giants haven’t scored a primary half landing but this season and have been outscored, 25-9, in first halves total.
They’ll must be harder to assault on protection, too. Pollard and Elliott mixed for 28 carries for 178 yards, a 6.3 yards per carry common. They principally attacked the perimeters of Wink Martindale’s protection, the place rookie Kayvon Thibodeaux made a quiet debut.
“First and foremost we gotta stop the run on D,” security Julian Love stated. “It all starts there really.”
Jones’ offense obtained the ball again with an opportunity to tie on their very own nine-yard line with 1:45 to play. Love and edge Jihad Ward made a key third-down cease on Cowboys tight finish Jake Ferguson to pressure a punt.
“I had faith,” Ward stated. “I was like, ‘There’s a lot of time on there.’ We just gotta beat these motherf—ers. Three more plays, shut this sh-t down.”
But Sills slipped on the fourth play of the drive. Diggs intercepted Jones’ cross. And Shepard collapsed to the turf on the alternative aspect of the sector, leaving the Giants crushed in additional methods than one.
Barkley had put the Giants up seven with a blistering 36-yard TD run with 5:31 to play within the third quarter. He adopted robust blocking from his offensive line, broke an Anthony Barr deal with, juked security Donovan Wilson after which bounced exterior and outran Diggs to the entrance left pylon.
It was the primary dashing TD allowed by the Cowboys’ protection this season.
But Rush and the Cowboys answered rapidly with 75-yard and 89-yard landing drives to take command.
Elliott’s one-yard TD run by way of a Tae Crowder arm deal with tied it at 13 apiece with 27 seconds to play within the third. Then CeeDee Lamb made a one-handed, one-yard TD catch over Adoree Jackson on a fade for the 20-13 lead with 8:30 remaining within the fourth.
A reasonably loud “Let’s Go Cowboys” chant broke out at MetLife Stadium after the rating.
Lamb made 4 catches for 48 yards on the go-ahead drive, together with a key four-yard catch on fourth and 4 from the Giants’ 41-yard line with 10:27 to play in a tie sport. It was the suitable name by the Cowboys’ Mike McCarthy and Kellen Moore.
Drops by Shepard and Golladay gave Dallas the ball again, and a 28-yard punt return by the Cowboys’ KaVontae Turpin arrange Brett Maher’s 44-yard discipline purpose to place the Cowboys up, 23-13, with 5:58 to play.
“I’m beating myself up about it,” Golladay stated of his drop. “I definitely wish I could have it back.”
The Giants’ Graham Gano answered that with a 51-yard discipline purpose, his third of the sport, at 3:37 of the fourth quarter for the ultimate rating.
But between Turpin’s punt return and Dorance Armstrong’s block of a Gano discipline purpose strive on the sport’s opening drive, particular groups price the Giants six factors of their seven-point loss.
Neal, the rookie, was one of many linemen who overpowered on the sector purpose block, as effectively.
“I just got to play better,” he stated. “There’s no other way to call it.”
That went for nearly each participant on the Giants apart from Jones on Monday. He can’t do it alone.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com