January 9, 2009
GIANTS 44, SEAHAWKS 6
Giants dominate Seahawks to stay unbeaten
The Giants usually shrug about things such as their
place in the NFL hierarchy, what people think about them, where they fit in so-called pundit power rankings.
So it was a little startling - almost as startling as yesterday's final score - to hear one of the most reflective of the Giants' players put the team in something of a historical perspective.
"Good teams can win games," center Shaun O'Hara said after a 44-6 trouncing of the Seahawks, "but I think that you start to creep into that 'great' category when you can find a way to really put a team away. I think we're excited that we found a way to do that."
They may be creeping up on greatness, but they showed no such subtlety in leveling Seattle, piling up numbers generations of Giants fans have never witnessed. The 38-point margin was the largest in the regular season since a 62-10 rout of the Eagles in 1972. Their 523 total yards (eighth in franchise history) was the most in a Giants victory since they had 535 against the Saints in 1967. That's four years before Archie Manning arrived in New Orleans to play for the Saints.
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And in case you hadn't heard, they did it without their most prolific offensive weapon, Plaxico Burress, who served a one-game suspension.
"That was what we call a good old-fashioned you-know-what," Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren said, unable to utter the vulgarity. "They really took it to us today."
Even Kevin Boss, the tight-lipped tight end, couldn't help but giggle a bit during this laugher. He said he and fellow tight end Mike Matthews were talking about how this game felt like one of those high school blowouts in which "everything's working" and the kids from jayvee get to mop up the fourth quarter.
"I think we're all confident," Boss said. "We take it game by game, but we all know we can get back to the playoffs and make another run at it."
The Giants (4-0) opened the game ruthlessly, leaving quarterback Matt Hasselbeck writhing on the turf with a knee injury at the end of his first possession (he returned) and effortlessly going 91 yards in four plays for a 7-0 lead. Brandon Jacobs' career-long 44-yard run set up a 32-yard touchdown pass from Eli Manning to Domenik Hixon, Burress' replacement. And from there it didn't stop.
The Giants scored on their first six possessions, including a pair of touchdown dives by Jacobs and a 23-yard pass from Manning to Sinorice Moss, who replaced the replacement. After Hixon left the game with a concussion, Moss took his spot and reaped the rewards with the first two TD passes of his career.
Jacobs ran 15 times for 136 yards, the second-highest total of his career, and Manning completed 19 of 25 passes for 267 yards in just three quarters.
"It was just one of those days where you felt confident every time you took the field that you were going to go down and score," guard Chris Snee said, "and that pretty much was the case."
Even backup quarterback David Carr joined the deluge, throwing a 5-yard pass to Moss to cap the scoring. The Giants punted only twice and, for the third straight game, did not commit a turnover.
It was such an offensive outburst that Hasselbeck said at one point he looked up at the stats that scroll around the stadium and thought to himself: "That can't be right."
The defense pulverized Seattle (1-3), limiting it to 187 net yards and 1-for-11 on third down. The Seahawks produced only two field goals, one on a drive that started at the 40 after a kickoff went out of bounds. The Giants didn't knock Hasselbeck out of the game when Justin Tuck and Fred Robbins high-lowed his right leg in the first quarter, but put him on the bench in the fourth quarter when the game was out of hand.
"We put our foot down and kept mashing; that's what I'm most proud of with this team," linebacker Antonio Pierce said. "In every phase. Offense didn't let up, they kept attacking. Defense kept going out there and getting sacks, stopping the run. I don't know what the final stats were, but I think it was pretty impressive."
Not impressive enough to sway Pierce's thinking about the Giants' place atop the league as one of two remaining undefeateds. He coyly suggested that he doesn't remember how last season ended and said wins like this one are only appetizers for the main course later in the season, especially when the Giants start playing NFC East opponents. He called games like yesterday's "stepping stones."
"It's too early. We're not worried about that," Pierce said when asked if this win cemented the Giants as the team to beat or, as O'Hara said, were approaching greatness. "Now if this was February, whenever that bowl game is, then we'd be 'Whoo! Whoo!' But we ain't got nothing to talk about now."
Still, 44-6 against a potential playoff team? That deserves at least one Whoo!
GOING LONG
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