Vikings 20, Giants 19

Vikings rally past Giants to snag their first NFC North title
Associated Press - From NFL.com

MINNEAPOLIS -- The New York Giants already were comfortably in the playoffs. However, there was nothing comfortable about the Minnesota Vikings' situation, let alone their entire season.

With plenty of practice in dealing with drama, the Vikings rallied past the resting Giants for a 20-19 victory Sunday afternoon to qualify for the postseason for the first time in four years.

"They had to earn it, as it should be, and that makes it that much sweeter," Minnesota coach Brad Childress said.

Ryan Longwell's 50-yard field goal as time expired gave the Vikings their first division title since 2000, rendering Chicago's game at Houston moot in the NFC North race. The Bears lost to the Texans 31-24 anyway, but this was the way the Vikings (10-6) were determined to go into the playoffs. They didn't want to back into their first NFC North championship since the league realigned six years ago.

"It wouldn't have felt the same if we won the division by default," Minnesota left guard Steve Hutchinson said.

The Vikings will host the Philadelphia Eagles in a first-round playoff game at 4:30 p.m. ET next Sunday.

Quarterback Tarvaris Jackson was benched after two losses to open the season, the offense struggled into October, star middle linebacker E.J. Henderson was lost for the season to a foot injury, and the Vikings took a 3-4 record into their bye week. But they rebounded by winning five of their final six games and, despite last week's fumble-laden loss to the Atlanta Falcons and the Bears' overtime victory over the Green Bay Packers, they still had control of the tiebreaker -- and their fate.

The Giants (12-4) gave the Vikings a break well before the game started by beating the Carolina Panthers last week to clinch the top seed and gain home-field advantage throughout the NFC playoffs.

Derrick Ward, who fueled last week's win over the Panthers, gave the Giants two 1,000-yard rushers -- only the fourth such running back tandem in NFL history -- by finishing with 77 yards on 15 carries. Brandon Jacobs got there earlier this month. The last set of teammates to do that in the same season was Kevin Mack and Earnest Byner of the Cleveland Browns in 1985.

The Giants put four starters on the inactive list: Jacobs (knee), tight end Kevin Boss (ankle), cornerback Aaron Ross (concussion) and nose tackle Barry Cofield (knee). Quarterback Eli Manning was joined on the sideline by a steady stream of other regulars during the second half. When Jackson found a wide-open Bernard Berrian for a 54-yard touchdown pass to cut New York's lead to two points midway through the fourth quarter, it was a third-string cornerback -- Terrell Thomas -- who fell down trying to cover him.

"They're a very talented team, and we knew coming in they were going to give us everything they had," said Domenik Hixon, who caught a 23-yard touchdown pass from David Carr to give the Giants a 16-10 edge in the third quarter.

Really, it was the Giants who gave the Vikings all they could handle despite a bunch of backups on the field and a clearly conservative offensive strategy in the second half.

"We always talk about improvement and how important improvement is. That's the way to improve right there, under game conditions," New York coach Tom Coughlin said.

http://www.nfl.com/gamecenter/recap?game_id=29775&displayPage=tab_recap&season=2008&week=REG17

Giants 34, Panthers 28 F/OT

Giants beat Panthers in OT, wrap up top seed in NFC

Associated Press - From NFL.com

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- The NFC road to the Super Bowl will run through the Meadowlands because the New York Giants did what they had to do against frigid, swirling wind -- run the ball.

Derrick Ward ran for career-best 215 yards and set up Brandon Jacobs' winning 2-yard touchdown run with 9:57 left in overtime and the Super Bowl champion Giants re-established themselves as the team to beat by earning the NFC's top seed for the postseason with a thrilling 34-28 comeback victory over the Carolina Panthers on Sunday night.

"It's great for our fans to be able to play here at Giants Stadium," quarterback Eli Manning said after the Giants (12-3) snapped a two-game losing streak by rushing for a season-high 301 yards. "You never know what the weather is going to be like here. We're used to playing in those cold and windy games and I would like to think we would have the advantage in some of those. I think it will be fun playing the games at home."

The fans who braved the numbing wind chill has plenty of fun watching this one. They tossed snowballs onto the field earlier and threw it like confetti when Jacobs won the game.

"The last two weeks we've been disgraceful running the ball," said Ward, whose total was the fourth highest in Giants' history. "We've had our doubters, that we hit our peak in the past. We knew that we could run the ball. That's what the New York Giants are. We run the ball."

New York had clinched a first-round bye earlier in the day when Atlanta beat Minnesota, then added the icing on this frosty night by beating Carolina (11-4) in the winner-take-all game for the NFC's top seed.

"The only message we sent tonight is that team is getting that swagger back that we had last year at the end of the season," middle linebacker Antonio Pierce said. "They're going to fight for 60 minutes, overtime, cold weather, being down. To keep fighting, that's what I'm most proud of."

New York forced the overtime when Jacobs plowed into the end zone from a yard out, and Manning hit Domenik Hixon on a slant pattern for the tying 2-point conversion with 3:21 to play.

Jacobs, who was sidelined in last week's loss to Dallas with a knee injury, finished with three short touchdown runs, and Manning and Kevin Boss combined on a 4-yard touchdown pass as the Giants showed that the cold and wind was to their liking.

The loss spoiled a record-tying, four-touchdown performance by Panthers running back DeAngelo Williams, who gave Carolina a 28-20 lead with a 30-yard TD run 2 minutes into the final quarter. He also scored on runs of 13, 5 and 1 yards.

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Cowboys 20, Giants 8

Cowboys lean on defense to stifle Manning, Giants
Associated Press - From NFL.com

IRVING, Texas -- After all he and the Dallas Cowboys went through the last week, Tony Romo was one clutch play from the ultimate peacemaker: a victory.

And, for that clutch play, he threw to good pal Jason Witten.

This time, Terrell Owens was fine with that.

Witten gained 11 yards on a third-and-9 play late in the fourth quarter, keeping the New York Giants from getting the ball back with time to pull off a comeback. Then rookie Tashard Choice followed with a 38-yard touchdown run, and the Cowboys beat the Giants 20-8 on Sunday night to help their playoff chances and, perhaps, ensure at least one week's worth of locker-room harmony.

"It was just something we had to deal with," said Owens, no stranger to controversy. "We just stuck together. We knew what was important, and that was the game today."

While the soap-opera offense receives all the attention, the defense is doing much of the work in keeping the Cowboys (9-5) in the playoff hunt.

DeMarcus Ware sacked Eli Manning on New York's first snap, and the pressure never stopped. Ware finished with three sacks, upping his NFL-leading total to 19, and Dallas rang up a season-high eight. It was the unit's third straight game with at least five.

Cornerback Terence Newman, involved in his own tiff this week, intercepted two passes, and the Cowboys kept New York (11-3) without a touchdown for the first time since November 2004.

The Giants locked up the NFC East title last Sunday, but they have lost consecutive games for the first time since starting 0-2 last season. Both losses have come since star wide receiver Plaxico Burress shot himself in the leg and was lost for the season. Yet New York can flush it all away by winning its next game, at home Sunday night against Carolina in a matchup that will decide the top seed in the NFC playoffs.

"I'm disappointed, a little frustrated, but not concerned," said Manning, who was 18-of-34 passing for 191 yards with two interceptions. "We have to get back to playing good football. We'll have our hands full. The defense is playing well, but offensively, we're not doing our part."

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Eagles 20, Giants 14

Eagles jump back into playoff race by upsetting Giants

Associated Press - From NFL.com

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Donovan McNabb, Brian Westbrook and the desperate Philadelphia Eagles proved more of a headache for the New York Giants than all the chaos surrounding Plaxico Burress.

Westbrook ran 30 yards for a touchdown, caught another 40-yarder from McNabb, and the Eagles limited the Giants to 211 total yards in a 20-14 victory Sunday that ended the Super Bowl champions' seven-game winning streak and momentarily prevented them from clinching the NFC East.

"I just think we kind of beat them," said Eagles tight end L.J. Smith, who has six catches for 44 yards. "It's tough to say. That's one of those: 'How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll?' Who knows if the distractions hurt them and helped us? I don't know."

The statistics were all Philadelphia (7-5-1).

McNabb finished 19-of-30 for 191 yards on a windy day that the Eagles controlled the ball for almost 35 minutes. Westbrook was the workhorse, gaining 131 yards on a season-high 33 carries and catching six passes for 72 yards. The defense limited New York's league-leading rushing game to 88 yards.

"This was a big win," Westbrook said after the Eagles won their second straight game. "But we're in a position now where we have to win them all."

The Giants (11-2) won the division title anyway, when Pittsburgh beat Dallas later Sunday.
However, this is going to remembered as the game the Super Bowl champions came up empty on offense and defense after a week of scrutiny and media hype following the suspension of Burress for the rest of the season in a wake of nightclub shooting.

It also didn't help that there is an ongoing investigation into the role of middle linebacker Antonio Pierce in the aftermath of the incident in which Burress shot himself.

"It's a great story," defensive end Mathias Kiwanuka said. "I'm glad you can use it, but it's a dead issue with us."

Giants coach Tom Coughlin also downplayed the distraction theory.

"We didn't play well," he said. 'We didn't play the way we had been playing. We're a better football team than that. As far as all those other things go, that's all speculation."

http://www.nfl.com/gamecenter/recap?game_id=29727&displayPage=tab_recap&season=2008&week=REG14

From Hero To Zero

BAMBINO: The rise to fame is long and takes exruciatingly hard work to get there. The fall from grace is quick, the landing is hard, and the recovery is virtually non-existent. Plaxico Burress did just that with his boneheaded decision to carry an un-licensed loaded pistol into an NYC nightclub and then have it go off accidentally and hit him in the thigh.

I still cannot believe someone can be that stupid, especially after what transpired last season for Burress. He forever put himself into Giants' lore with is game winning catch in SB XLII, then puts himself into Giants' infamy with a variety of issues this season culminating with the gun incident.

Plax has no respect for his coaches, his team, and the fans with his selfish behavior. Now, the Giants placed him on the Reserve/Non-Football Injury List which in essence is a suspension without pay. I hope the Giants legally can void his contract and get his dumb-ass away from the Football Giants.

Lawrence Taylor, who practiced self destructive behavior during his down-time, never came close to this type of stuff. LT was loved by his team mates, coaches, and fans. We loved LT, because when Sunday came, he was ready to play and played with fury and passion despite his partying. Not that I, as a fan, didn't love Plaxico's contributions to last year's title, his laziness and constant bickering with Coach Coughlin, a coach who galvanized this team to a championship, was unacceptable to me.

Well, the Giants are deep at WR and I feel they can win without this cancer. The sooner he's away from Big Blue permanently, the better. Sorry Plax, but you stepped over the line too many times this year. Time to go.

Giants 23, Redskins 7

Giants sweep Redskins, fortify control of NFC East

Associated Press - From NFL.com

LANDOVER, Md. -- The New York Giants have shoved every distraction aside, including a shooting incident involving their star receiver, to become as dominant as, say, a Chicago Bulls team with Michael Jordan.

Perhaps that's no coincidence.

At one of the first meetings of training camp, coach Tom Coughlin discussed the 1991-92 Bulls as a team for the Giants to emulate in the bid to repeat as Super Bowl champions. That was the first season that MJ won a back-to-back, and the Giants remained solidly on pace to keep up with His Airness after Sunday's 23-7 victory over the Washington Redskins.

"That really kind of set our whole season going and focused in the right direction," receiver Amani Toomer said. "And we've been answering every call ever since."

Added defensive end Justin Tuck: "Maybe everybody wants to have something to do with Michael Jordan."

Jordan would certainly approve of the 11-1 record, as well as the way the Giants aren't letting anything -- on or off the field -- get in the way. Two days after Plaxico Burress accidentally shot himself at a Manhattan nightclub, the Men in Blue braved a dreary mid-Atlantic rain to hold Clinton Portis to a season-low 22 yards and produce Eli Manning's first 300-yard game of the season.

"We can't fly yet," Tuck said. "But on the football field, we're playing pretty well. Obviously you try your best to stay grounded and stay humble about it, but right now we're playing good football."

Burress' injuries are not serious, but he is expected to deal with a criminal charge over the shooting, his latest misstep in a season of fines and suspension. Coach Tom Coughlin said he addressed the team concerning Burress -- then it was back to football.

"Come Sunday, 1 o'clock, when the whistle's blowing in between those lines, and you're in the stadium, that's the only focus you've got," said linebacker Antonio Pierce, who reportedly was with Burress at the time of the shooting. "That's the only thing this team ever does is focus on our opponent and the challenge that's at hand. We had a lot of challenges obviously going into this game."

The Giants have won seven straight, including six in a row against teams with winning records, and have a three-game lead over the second-place Dallas Cowboys with four to play. They completed a sweep of the Redskins by manhandling them in the major statistical categories, including total yards (404-320) and time of possession (35:44-24:16).

They set the tone on the game's first drive, accepting the Redskins' dare to throw the ball in the bad weather. With Washington bracing for the run and playing a pressing man-to-man defense, Manning threw for 68 on the drive, capped when Toomer beat Fred Smoot one-on-one down the right sideline for a 40-yard touchdown.

"When a team presses you, they're kind of disrespecting you as a receiving corps," Toomer said, "so to get a big play like that early kind of lets them know we're not afraid of them -- and we'll go right at you."

The Redskins (7-5) never recovered because they don't have the offense to do so. They've lost three of four -- with all three losses at home and scored only four touchdowns combined in the four games. After a 6-2 start, they now trail Dallas in the wild-card race.

No one epitomized the Redskins' mood better than coach Jim Zorn, whose day was already rolling downhill when he watched his team fail to stop the Giants' first extra point -- even though the holder bobbled the ball badly.

"To have the holder be able to drop the ball, look up, reset the ball, and have them kick it through was very upsetting. Shouldn't have happened," Zorn said. "That kind of set me off, and I started whining about everything. I was on everybody. I was even on myself."

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