Giants Think They Can Keep Up with Dallas Cowboys in a Scoring Showdown
The last time the Giants and Cowboys played each other, the game turned into a scoring shootout in which a whopping 71 points were scored by both teams combined.
Since then, points have been hard to come by for the Giants. New York has scored just 26 points in their last three games, all losses. They also haven’t been able to replicate that 30+ point scoring performance from Week 5, and in fact haven’t scored more than 20 points in any contest since a 27-17 win over the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 10.
The Cowboys, meanwhile, would go on a four-game losing streak after that Giants game in which they too struggled to score at least 20 points. But after that, they’ve had a little better luck in lighting up the scoreboard, scoring at least 30 points in four out of their last six games (all wins) including their last three in a row.
The good news for the Giants is their defense has managed to hold some of the league’s most potent offenses, such as the Bucs, the Seahawks, the Cardinals, the Browns and the Ravens to under 30 points. So assuming the defense can curtail the scoring this weekend against the red-hot Cowboys, might the Giants hope that its sluggish offense finally wakes up?
“We’re confident as an offense,” said quarterback Daniel Jones, who will be under center this weekend as the Giants look to take one step closer to their first division title since 2011.
“We have to take advantage of our opportunities to score points, particularly when we get the ball in the red zone and move the ball down there. We’re certainly confident in our ability to do that and score points.”
Confidence is one thing, but parlaying that into production has been quite another. For one, the Giants’ scoring drought has been accentuated by the team’s inability to convert on third down where since achieving a season best 42.86 conversion percentage (9 of 21), the Giants have since gone 26.6% (12 of 45).
And when it’s come to the red zone, since converting 66.6% in their last winning effort (vs. Seattle), the Giants have converted on just two of seven red zone opportunities (28.5%) over their three-game losing streak.
Head coach Joe Judge knows that kind of production is not only unacceptable at this stage in the game, it’s also not conducive to playing playoff caliber football.
And he also knows that if Sunday’s game should develop into a scoring shootout, the Giants better be ready to keep up.
“We’ll do whatever it takes to win the game,” he said. “Look, we want to play defense to keep those kinds of points off the board, and offensively we’re trying to score every possession. We want to make sure we can finish drives better.”
Especially given what’s on the line.
