Brian Daboll’s Giants lose to Broncos, 33-32, in all-time choke job
DENVER — Brian Daboll yelled at defensive coordinator Shane Bowen on the sidelines, and tears streamed down Brian Burns’ face in the locker room, to sum up the Giants’ all-time loss Sunday, 33-32, to the Denver Broncos at Mile High.
“Disbelief,” veteran defensive lineman Rakeem Nunez-Roches said in the Giants’ empty locker room. “My biggest word is disbelief.”
NFL teams have won 1,602 consecutive games by leading by 18 points in the final six minutes, but Joe Schoen and Daboll’s Giants (2-5) are pioneers when it comes to writing a bad story.
The Broncos scored all 33 of their points in the fourth quarter. It was the most points scored in the fourth quarter by a team that had been shut out in the first three quarters.
Never.
The Giants suffered their eighth-largest lead in team history and the largest since blowing a 21-point lead in 2014.
The Giants dominated early and led 19-0, on a Tyrone Tracy Jr. rushing touchdown with 2:41 left in the third quarter. They pushed the lead back to 26-8 with 10:14 left on a 41-yard touchdown run by Theo Johnson.
Then they relaxed, started “partying too soon,” in the words of Nunez-Roches, and caused a jaw-dropping collapse for the ages.
“I wouldn’t say it’s human nature. I would say right now it’s our nature,” the veteran lineman said in a damning critique of the Giants’ identity. “And we need to remove this from our DNA right now.
“We’ve done it many times,” he continued. “We’ve been in a situation where we could have stifled a team and somehow we gave them momentum, we gave them life, we made a turnover or a penalty. And then there’s the change that they need. And then we never recover from that.”
Nunez-Roches looked tired, and he was right: That’s who the Giants are until they show otherwise.
Something has to change.
Daboll’s actions on the sidelines seemed to indicate that Bowen’s professional status could be that impending change.
The head coach denied yelling at Bowen directly on the sideline as the Broncos drove to Will Lutz’s game-winning 39-yard field as time expired.
“No,” Daboll said. “We lost the game.”
But Daboll’s history is of scapegoating coordinators and assistants, then firing them or urging them to resign. This precedent is as well documented as Daboll’s 3-16 record in the Giants’ last 19 games.
The head coach admitted that he didn’t say much to his players after the game either. So they return home not knowing how to avoid the disappointments that have become a defining characteristic of who they are.
“There’s no need to talk much when you lose a game like that,” Daboll said, unnecessarily.
Rookie quarterback Jaxson Dart threw three touchdown passes and scored a 1-yard rushing touchdown with 37 seconds left to take the lead, 32-30. But kicker Jude McAtamney’s second missed extra point left the door open for Denver, and the Broncos quickly drove 56 yards for Lutz’s game-winning field goal.
Bo Nix’s first completion of that final drive, a 29-yard rope to Marvin Mims Jr. down the left seam, was later a sore subject for Giants players in the locker room.
Bowen rushed three and dropped eight players in coverage, similar to the plan he implemented on the Dallas Cowboys’ key completion in the Giants’ grueling Week 2 loss in Arlington, Texas. Safety Tyler Nubin seemingly overran the play and left an opening for Nix’s pass to find Mims.
Dexter Lawrence stared at a reporter for five seconds when asked about that play call before saying, “I’ll leave that to the coaches.” »
Burns was also filmed screaming in frustration over being “lost eight” as he entered the tunnel leading to the Giants’ locker room following the loss. But Burns later blamed the loss on the players’ execution.
“There is no chance that we [should] lose this game,” Burns said. “We gave them that. We had fallen soldiers. We’re not even going to criticize that… We didn’t execute well enough. I put all of this on us. We have to play better. I know [Daboll] will take responsibility, and [people are going to say] It’s his fault and this and that. No. At the end of the day, we play the game. We have to play the game.”
The biggest punch is that the Giants (2-5) had a chance to return home with a 3-4 record with a real chance to upset the NFC East with a second win in three weeks against the Philadelphia Eagles (5-2) next Sunday at Lincoln Financial Field.
Instead, they dug a deeper hole in last place in the division behind the Dallas Cowboys (3-3-1) and Washington Commanders (3-4). And they’ve shown ownership and the front office that this team isn’t good enough to justify a costly trade for a No. 1 wide receiver that would require giving up future high-end draft picks in exchange.
“We gotta finish, bro,” corner Cor’Dale Flott said. “That’s the biggest problem in all of this. It’s not easy. It hurts.”
Coincidence or not, the Broncos’ deluge began when starting corner Paulson Adebo left the game with a knee injury and was replaced by embattled former first-round pick Deonte Banks.
Safety Dane Belton established a key goal line in the second quarter, while playing in place of injured safety Jevon Holland (knee), to preserve the Giants’ 13-0 shutout lead at halftime. But Adebo’s decline to Banks has been dramatic.
The Broncos attacked the edges in the running game in the fourth quarter with great success.
However, the defense was also tired, as Dart and the offense suddenly couldn’t sustain drives in the fourth.
Dart and the offense made two straight three-and-outs. The first ended with a punt and the second ended with a Dart interception against Broncos linebacker Justin Strnad with 4:47 left to aid Denver’s stunning comeback.
“I feel like as an offense we had a chance to finish the game with the ball in our hands twice, to do what we did last week against Philly and we couldn’t do it.” said left guard Jon Runyan Jr.. “We let it slip through our fingers.
“In this situation, we have the ball, we have to finish this game with the ball in our hands and we let our defense down,” Runyan said. “We got them back on the field with three and two outs. We also turned the ball over. Guys [on defense] were tired. »
And so Nix suddenly had four total touchdowns – two passing and two rushing. His designed 18-yard run down the left side gave Denver a 30-6 lead with 1:51 left.
Even in the face of the Giants’ epic collapse, Dart showed no abandon.
He converted a 4th-and-19 to Wan’Dale Robinson on the Giants’ final drive. He backed it up with a Broncos interference penalty on a 38-yard pass on a deep ball intended for Beaux Collins at the goal line.
And he crossed the goal line for that one-yard touchdown and another Giants lead with 37 seconds left.
But the lasting image of this game was not yet there.
The lasting image was of Daboll yelling at Bowen seconds after Nix completed a 22-yard pass to Courtland Sutton with Banks in coverage to set up a spike and stop the clock for Lutz’s kick.
Daboll’s heated dialogue with Bowen continued as the coaches stormed off the field toward the losers’ locker room. And now the consequences are imminent.
It’s just a question for who. And how soon?
Someone has to pay for this embarrassment. This disaster. The unacceptable DNA of this team.
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