PHILADELPHIA – The Cardiac Giants were in overtime again, because Eli Manning’s fourthquarter magic had turned to fourth-quarter tragic.
He had thrown two devastating interceptions in the last 3:28 of regulation, and cost his team a chance to put the Eagles away.
He prayed for a chance for redemption as Mike McMahon got the ball first at his 33.
Big Blue gave him that chance.
Manning started at his 33.
On third-and-7, he spun away from pressure and found Jeremy Shockey for 12 yards, to his 48. Tiki Barber ran for 10 more.
On third-and-3 at the Philly 35, incomplete for Jim Finn in the left flat. No Jay Feely.
Tom Coughlin put the game in his quarterback’s shaky hands rather than his field goal kicker’s shaky right foot.
Six of one, half dozen of the other. Jevon Kearse hit Manning as he attempted to pass and Brian Dawkins intercepted.
To add to the drama, the 8-5 Cowboys had just survived the Chiefs.
McMahon rolled to his right and was clobbered by Osi Umenyiora.
McMahon fumbled, and Kenderick Allen recovered at the Philly 27.
The scoreboard clock read 7:38 p.m.
On came Feely, sleepless since Seattle, for the 36-yard field goal.
The Eagles called time.
The crowd howled.
Feely made it.
Michael Strahan lifted him into the air.
Giants 26, Eagles 23.
Call it gritty, call it gutty, but make sure you call it for what it was: The Great Escape.
Manning better be better than this for the Giants to be better than this.
The injury bug had finally bitten Big Blue, and with a vengeance, so this was a fairer fight now. Antonio Pierce was gone in the first quarter, necessitating a wholesale change in the linebacking corps. Luke Petitgout was already gone when Kareem McKenzie’s hamstring betrayed him on a PAT early in the second quarter, meaning Bob Whitfield was the left tackle, Jason Whittle was the left guard and David Diehl, the starting left guard, was the right tackle. No sympathy here from the Eagles, of course, playing without Donovan McNabb and Terrell Owens and Brian Westbrook.
And so the Giants found themselves locked in a 17-17 death struggle with their battered but bitter rivals at halftime. Ryan Moats (5-89, 2TDs) looked like Reggie Bush all of a sudden. McMahon began looking like he was operating against the University of Buffalo. Coughlin conceded a 42-yard field goal at the end of the half to David Akers rather
than accept a penalty that would have pushed the Eagles, who were out of timeouts, back 10 yards.
Their world, and their season, was turning upside down.
Someone needed to turn it right side up.
And no one could.
Coughlin needed Manning to be more than a game manager now. He needed his quarterback to be a playmaker.
Manning is lucky he has Barber to take the pressure off him; there will be occasions when he will have to take the pressure off Barber.
This was one of them.
The Giants were surprise Super Bowl contenders because Manning has improved by leaps and bounds from his rookie indoctrination.
He is the Hope Diamond in and around Giants Stadium. The future is bright.
It was also now.
It almost turned out to be never.
Manning completed his first five passes on the drive that ended with a field goal only because 6-foot-5 Plaxico Burress could not bring down a fade in the left corner of the end zone against 5-foot-11 Roderick Hood. It was 20-17.
Now Manning dumped one off to Crazy Legs Barber, who zigged when Eagles zagged for 34 yards, and soon it was 23-17.
But then The Kid made The Big Mistake. It was 23-20 when he overthrew Shockey and was intercepted by Sheldon Brown at the Philly 43.
Soon it was 23-23.
Now Eli, from the Philly 46, had Shockey wide open and overthrew him and was intercepted by Michael Lewis with 29 seconds left in regulation.
Sometimes it is better to be lucky than good.
