The New York Giants fell to 2-8 after getting routed by the Dallas Cowboys 49-17 at AT&T Stadium on Sunday.
Without their two top quarterbacks, Daniel Jones and his backup, Tyrod Taylor, the Giants were forced to go with undrafted rookie free agent Tommy DeVito, and the offense struggled. DeVito was under constant pressure, and he was sacked five times. The Giants finished with only 172 total yards.
Defensively, New York had no answers for the Cowboys. Dallas scored 49 points and had 640 total yards. The 640 total yards were the second-most ever allowed by the Giants. Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott completed 26 of 35 passes for 404 yards, four touchdowns and one interception. In addition, Prescott had a rushing touchdown.
New York was beat up and beat down by the Cowboys. They got embarrassed.
“It’s definitely tough right now,” Giants running back Saquon Barkley said. “Losing like that, get embarrassed week after week, but you got to be a man about it, obviously you can be in your feeling about it for a short time but you got to get ready for the next week, that’s NFL.”
The Giants were noticeably frustrated on the sideline. Wide receivers Sterling Shepard and Darius Slayton were seen having an animated discussion on the sideline. Head coach Brian Daboll and DC Wink Martindale reportedly had a long discussion; Barkley and Daboll also reportedly had an exchange after New York failed to convert on a fourth and two deep in Cowboys’ territory.
Daboll downplayed all those sideline interactions.
Shepard said he was trying to motivate Slayton.
“Yeah, just trying to motivate him and keep him going,” Shepard said. “It’s frustrating obviously look at the score board and how the game went down it’s frustrating, but I was just trying to motivate him to keep on going and fighting through it really.”
Slayton said Shepard was trying to settle him down after Slayton was having what he called a ‘spirited conversation’ with wide receives coach Mike Groh.
Barkley said he was not arguing with Daboll.
“I mean, we didn’t get the conversion on the fourth and three, and was I frustrated we didn’t get it, yes,” he said. “So maybe it was a sign of frustration but there was no argument or nothing like that, it was football.”
This season, the Giants were swept by the Cowboys and were outscored 89-17. Last season, they were o-4 against the Cowboys and Eagles, and it appears they’ll have a similar record against both teams in 2023. Ultimately, Barkley knows if New York ever wants to make noise in the NFC East, they have to beat the Cowboys and Eagles.
“I don’t think it was more or less because it was the Dallas Cowboys, but it’s a bit tough,” Barkley said. “You know my six years here going against Dallas and Philly and coming up short and getting our butt whooped against them, but if we want to be the team that we want to go to, those are the teams that we have to match-up against and win, and we haven’t been doing that since I’ve been here.”
