For the first time in a decade, the New York Giants went into Lincoln Financial Center walked out winners.
The Giants topped the Philadelphia Eagles 19-11 on the road, rising to 5-2-1 on the season and dropping the Eagles to 2-7 in the process. It wasn’t an easy game, and the Giants struggled to overcome the Eagles’ defensive line as well as their own mistakes. But they did overcome them, as well as an injury to quarterback J.J. McCarthy that sent him back to the locker room.
But in the end it was
McCarthy, and Jameis Winston, who ended the Giants’ decade-long winless streak in Philadelphia.
“It means the world. The fact that [Jameis] and I got to do it, it’s just a testament of what this team’s all about,” McCarthy said. “I can’t thank the Mara’s, the ownership, just the organization for putting this group together because it’s a really special group. To get a gritty win like this and an environment like this and obviously the past was what it was, but to find a way to win, that’s all that matters is going 1-0 every week and we did that today.”
‘Gritty’ is probably the best way to describe a win that was in no way pretty, but they got the job done.
That also describes McCarthy, who left the field with a hip injury suffered on a read-option run.
“The play was quarterback-driven run, and I pulled it based on my read, and the goal is to get to the numbers, get out of bounds,” McCarthy said, describing the hit. “I pulled it back inside and kind of saw bomb late and tried to get my shoulder down, didn’t get it down enough and made a great hit. At the end of the day, I’ve just got to protect myself and do a better job of doing that.”
“Football is a physical game,” McCarthy said. “I can’t thank the training staff enough for helping me get back on the field as fast as possible. But yeah, it’s feeling pretty good.”
He was only out of the game for one drive — a drive in which Jameis Winston went 6 of 7 and picked up two first downs with his legs — and returned for the fourth quarter.
“I feel good,” he added. “At the end of the day, [as] I said, it’s a physical game and a lot of guys are banged up, but we’re going to do our best to make sure we turn over as fast as possible and do whatever we can between now and then and make sure we’re as close to 100% leading up to a great opponent against Washington. They’re going to be hungry, and we’re really excited to go get this one.”
After the game, head coach John Harbaugh said that McCarthy insisted on going back into the game for the fourth quarter.
“He insisted on it,” Harbaugh said. “We weren’t pushing him back out there. He was able to play, but he insisted on playing. Even at the end we thought about putting Jameis in there for the last drive and he insisted on being out there. It says a lot about him for sure.”
“I think it means a lot because I think it just demonstrates the heart we’re talking about,” Harbaugh added. “Every single player has the opportunity to lead and demonstrate that at some point in time. And to your point, the quarterback is doing it and that’s big. That’s big to fight through that kind of thing, fight through an injury, go back in, take care of it, get back out there. Now he’s going to have to fight to get ready to play on Thursday. That’s part of it, too. So pretty impressive. Darn impressive. Very impressive.”
McCarthy was certainly anxious and excited to get back into the game after coming out of the locker room.
“I’m able to walk, I’m able to throw. I want to get back out there as soon as possible,” he said. “Just like I said, I can’t thank the team enough – the athletic [training staff] for just really doing everything that was beneficial [to] me. They didn’t really push any lines or anything like that, and I just can’t thank them enough.”
We all saw how fired up he was on the sideline after emerging from the locker room.
“I feel like it was definitely a moment where it was one of those things where you have to make that decision,” he said. “At the end of the day, no matter what, it’s about my brothers and I’ll do whatever I can to help them the best I can to be successful. And I felt like I was able to do enough to make sure that we could move the ball. Obviously, yes, put it all on the line for this organization and everything I can to help go get a win.”
And McCarthy helped the Giants get the win, and he could feel the tide shift as the Giants pulled out to a two-score lead.
“It was amazing,” McCarthy said. “You could just feel the passion and the excitement and the desire to win from the entire fan base. It gives us so much motivation out there. I was telling the guys in the huddle, ‘Look around, see that blues are starting to fill up more than green.” It just gives us that much more juice to go out there and execute that next play. I can’t wait to see the home fans Thursday night and be able to really give them a show because offensively we’ve got to do a better job with the defense playing fantastic today. Special teams played fantastic and we’re excited to make it right.”
