Praising the Eagles was about the only move left for the Giants after they converted just one of seven third-down conversions in the first half and failed on two crucial fourth-and-short plays later on.
After the Eagles' 23-11 victory, Giants center Shaun O'Hara summed up the sensation of going from Super Bowl champions to exiting the postseason without beating the Eagles or anybody else, losing at home after winning all their playoff games on the road last season. He called it "probably the worst feeling in the world."
"You almost wonder if it's better to not make the playoffs than exit the way we did," O'Hara said.
Speaking of the "remorse" felt in the Giants locker room, coach Tom Coughlin talked about his team's failure to score in the Green Zone. That zone was the entire field since that's how far New York's failure spread.
Even Coughlin's proven ability to divine whether to throw a challenge flag left him. On one fourth-and-short play, Coughlin and his staff watching monitors upstairs were convinced that tailback Derrick Ward had been given a bad spot by officials.
"Couldn't imagine the spot was right," Coughlin said later. "Obviously, I challenged."
Replays showed a completely fair placing of the ball. Ward had rolled past the first-down marker but not before he hit the ground. With fourth and inches at the Giants' 45-yard line, his team trailing, 20-11, Coughlin called for a quarterback sneak.
"We had the play we wanted - the sneak," Coughlin said. "They just did a good job of loading up."
The Eagles stuffed Eli Manning and stopped Jacobs on fourth and 2 on the next drive, with 61/2 minutes left in the game. Coughlin blamed himself for the play call, saying he thought it was fourth and 1, that he would have called timeout and "possibly" changed the play.
