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DENVER – In overdramatized terms, the Giants left their season up to Nic Jones and Beau Brade over Dexter Lawrence and Abdul Carter.
It went as badly as that sounds.
Head coach Brian Daboll is correct in repeating on loop Sunday that blowing a 19-point fourth-quarter lead and allowing 33 fourth-quarter points in a 33-32 loss to the Broncos doesn’t boil down to one play.
But the play – and the call made by coordinator Shane Bowen – that is hardest for the defense to stomach was the decision to only send Roy Robertson-Harris, Brian Burns and Kayvon Thibodeaux at quarterback Bo Nix and drop eight in coverage with 33 seconds remaining. The Pro Bowler Lawrence and first-round pick Carter watched from the sideline.
Linebacker Bobby Okereke sunk off into an intermediate zone.
Because big-money, free-agent signings Jevon Holland and Paulson Adebo both were sidelined by knee injuries, the seven defensive backs included Jones (playing his second defensive snap of the season) and Brade (playing is first).
Not to mention Deonte Banks, the benched former first-round draft pick who quarterbacks target as soon as he steps on the field.
Marvin Mims Jr. caught a 29-yard pass with Dru Phillips draped on his back and five Giants encircling the ball, Mims Jr. and receiver Courtland Sutton.
“Leave that to the coaches,” Lawrence said after a long pause to gather thoughts when asked about not being more aggressive at the end of the game.
A livid Burns screamed up the tunnel after the loss about choosing to “drop eight” in coverage. That emotion turned somber as Burns shed tears at his locker.
Would he have liked to see the Giants be more aggressive?
“I don’t know about all that,” a calmer Burns said. “We were rushing three, dropping eight.”
Asked to expand on what he thought of that strategy, Burns pursed his lips and did not answer.
It was reminiscent of when the Giants were in a similar final-seconds spot and deployed a similar light pass rush in Week 2 against the Cowboys, surrendering field position for the tying field goal and then the overtime victory.
Not the same play call – as head coach Brian Daboll pointed out in defense of Bowen – but the same passive approach that Bowen regretted then.
“I wish we would have been a little bit tighter (in coverage),” Bowen said on Sept. 18. “Just like all these calls that don’t work, (you) second guess that you probably wish you went in a different direction.”
After killing the clock, Nix went at Banks for a 22-yard catch by Sutton that turned a would-be 61-yard field goal into a walk-off chip-shot. The Giants sent four rushers on that play, but it was too-little too-late at that point.
“I’m out there making plays that come to me,” Banks said. “I got picked on the second play – that was a great play by Sutton. Other than that, I feel like I was OK.”
Burns put the blame for the loss on the players’ execution and tried to take heat off Daboll, but he didn’t mention (or exonerate) Bowen one way or the other.
“We got put in a position where we could’ve won, but we gave it back to them. I put that all on us. We have to play better,” Burns said. “Dabes is going to take the blame – his fault and this and that. Nah. At the end of the day, we’re playing and we have to make that play. That’s our fault.”
Burns and Lawrence both credited Bowen for calling a great game last week against the Eagles, after saying they urged him to be more aggressive.
