DETROIT—If you wanted to know whether the Giants would still play for Tom Coughlin and each other now that the playoffs are no longer a possibility. Or if you wondered if the coach could still motivate his men to play with the kind of fight and heart that is expected from such a proud franchise. All you had to do was watch Giants 23, Lions 20 in overtime Sunday afternoon at Ford Field.
Their pride has been questioned along with their commitment. But the Giants answered their critics by out-lasting a team that had everything to play for when the road team presumably had nothing for motivation. Now we know the Giants haven’t given up on themselves or their coach.
“They’ve taken a lot of shots this year with the criticism,” Tom Coughlin said after the Giants improved to 6-9. “But we’ve been able to stay focused and touch on some real deep values that get overlooked when people tell you you’ve got nothing to play for. You have everything in the world to play for and I think tonight was a good demonstration of it.”
Sure, it doesn’t erase all of the disappointment, but the Giants proved there is plenty of meaning in games someone else might call meaningless.
It wasn’t meaningless to wide receiver Jerrel Jernigan, who started in place of the injured Victor Cruz, and played the kind of the game that will move him up the depth chart next season. He caught six passes for 80 yards, scored his first touchdown, and made the fourth-down catch in overtime to help create the game-winning field goal.
“It’s something I’ve been waiting on for a while,” Jernigan said.
It wasn’t meaningless to safety Antrel Rolle, whose first-half fumble recovery led to a Giants touchdown. And it wasn’t meaningless to defensive end Justin Tuck, who wants to remain a Giant and showed his worth by intercepting a Matthew Stafford pass at the line of scrimmage to help position the Giants for a valuable field goal.
“Anytime you get a win, the next day is going to be a good day for you,” Tuck said.
It also wasn’t meaningless to safety Will Hill who started his weekend by being arrested for failing to make child support payments. He redeemed himself for creating the distraction with a 38-yard interception return for a touchdown to tie the game 20-20 in the fourth quarter.
“To see Will’s feet chopping up and down toward the end zone was a beautiful thing,” said defensive end Mathias Kiwanuka, who had two sacks and a forced fumble.
Nor was it meaningless to offensive lineman Dallas Reynolds, who got his chance to play when Brandon Mosley, who started at right guard, left the game after the Giants’ first series with a broken hand. The seldom used Reynolds was suddenly nose-to-nose with Ndamukong Suh.
“He had to go in there and battle Suh and he did a nice job,” Coughlin said.
It wasn’t meaningless for Eli Manning either. He was coming off a five-interception game and needed to quiet whispers that his best days might be behind him. Though Manning (23-of-42 for 256 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT) struggled with his accuracy, he got it done in overtime, orchestrating the 11-play 45-yard drive that earned the game-winning 45-yard field goal by Josh Brown.
“We demonstrated resilience,” Coughlin said. “We demonstrated mental toughness.”
The players admitted it was tough to have their pride questioned after a 23-0 home loss to Seattle last week. Proving people wrong is what these final two games are about.
“We know how serious we take this and how much we love to play this game. And how much we put into practice and in games,” Kiwanuka said. “It’s tough to be questioned like that. But at the end of the day we know what we have. We have a lot of pride in this locker room and in this organization.
The Giants proved two things Sunday at Ford Field: they haven’t quit on themselves and they haven’t quit on their coach.