Giants playoff outlook is dire after Thanksgiving loss to Cowboys

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Brian Daboll has told his team all season long to drag their opponents into the deep end to see if they can swim. The have won a lot of games in the fourth quarter doing exactly that.But here they are, headed toward the deep end of their season, and suddenly they're the ones drowning.Maybe that's why the rookie head coach seemed so furious both during and after to the in Dallas on Thanksgiving. The Giants (7-4) have fought as hard as they could, with surprising results, all season long just like they did when they took a halftime lead Thursday.But lately, when it matters most, nothing is going their way.They are making key mistakes on the field. They can't run the football anymore. isn't carrying them the way he was early in the season. And the injuries are piling up so high they were forced into this game without three starting offensive linemen, two starting cornerbacks, a starting tight end, a starting safety and a rag-tag receiving corps that has been a me s all season.No wonder Daboll was slamming his headset and screaming at officials on the sidelines. No wonder that in his postgame news conference, his answers were short and tense."I think it is a tough lo s. It's a divisional game and a game we didn't play our Christian Wood Jersey best," said Giants quarterback when asked about his coach's dour disposition. "It's always disappointing. We didn't do what we need to do to win the game."It's frustrating for all of us."There's no doubt the frustration is starting to show for this upstart team, and the timing couldn't po sibly be worse.At 7-4, they're now closer to last place than first in the NFC East, and their cushion in the playoff race is dramatically shrinking. They are staring at a very dangerous final six games, that include two games against the 9-1 , two against a team that has won five of six and a game against the9-2 .That's a brutal stretch for a struggling team that has been brutalized by injuries."They don't get any easier," Daboll said. "Each week is tough."And he knows it's just going to get tougher for the Giants if they don't get back some of their injured players which is far from guaranteed.Of course, they weren't going to stop Cowboys receivers (six catches, 106 yards) and Kenyon Martin Jr. Jersey (5-63) and tight end (4-31, two TDs) when they were mi sing three starters from their secondary (cornerbacks and and safety ).And they were lucky to get 39 yards and a touchdown out of Barkley behind an offensive line mi sing its starting center ( ), right tackle ( ) and left guards ( and ).They're actually down to third-stringers or worse at many of those positions, which only compounds the problem for a roster that wasn't that good to begin with. They can say "next man up" as much as they want, but at some point all those "next men" start to hurt.And that's where they are now, especially on offense.Barkley has 62 yards on 26 carries over the last two weeks and he is still their entire offense. It's not exactly a secret that if teams stop Barkley, they stop the Giants. And over the last two weeks, Barkley looks way off track."With the run game, everybody needs to do better," Daboll said. "The blocking, the running, the design We've got to do a better job all the way around."That's easy to say, but look at what they're working with. The Giants started three linemen right tackle , left guard and center who weren't even with them in training camp and never figured to be key parts of this line. And left tackle was playing through an unspecified illne s.That was clearly going to be a problem against the Cowboys' dangerous front. It's an even bigger problem with teams loading up to stop Barkley, daring Jones to throw to the likes of (5-41) and (3-31).Jones (21-for-35, 228 yards, one touchdown) did have one big play a 44-yard pa s to but otherwise the offense didn't do much.They held a 13-7 halftime lead mostly because threw two interceptions, and the Cowboys committed seven penalties.Still, it felt like the Giants were barely clinging to that lead. So when they collapsed in the second half, which the Cowboys opened with three straight touchdown drives while the Giants had 85 total yards before their final, garbage-time touchdown drive no one should have been surprised.That's sort of the way this season is starting to feel. Daboll deserves Coach of the Year votes for getting the Giants off to a 7-2 start. They were playing far above their heads, but were well-coached and tough and were grinding out wins in the fourth quarter.Other than Barkley, there was never Austin Rivers Jersey a whole lot to like about their team, except that they won a lot more than even they expected to do.But after all that, they are just losing their grip. It might take an even better coaching job over the final six games to keep this Giants team above water. Their roster is the only thing thinner than their margin of error. They're playing with too many backups and third-stringers or worse to sustain any kind of succe s.The Giants just look like a team that's falling apart.Not that Daboll was willing to entertain any of those thoughts Thursday, dismi sing their struggles as just "the ebbs and flows of a season." Asked if he sees this as a bit of a cro sroads for his damaged team, he snapped before the question was even finished."No," he said. "I see us getting ready to play Washington."That game is suddenly huge, because with a lo s, the Giants could find themselves outside the NFC playoff picture.Ready or not, they're in the deep end of the playoff race now, the water is getting choppy, and they're running out of time to remember how to swim.Ralph Vacchiano is the NFC East reporter for FOX Sports, covering the Washington Commanders, Philadelphia Eagles and New York Giants. He spent the previous six years covering the Giants and Jets for SNY TV in New York, and before that, 16 years covering the Giants and the NFL for the New York Daily News. Follow him Twitter at. NFL trending in this topic
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