PHILADELPHIA _ In a league in which coaches and quarterbacks almost always determine the outcome of your season, the Giants were decidedly lacking on both counts Sunday in what may have been the final blow to an unlikely playoff run.
The Giants had a chance to win a third straight game and pull to within two games of the lead in a watered-down NFC East. And it seemed they might actually do just that by thoroughly outplaying the defending Super Bowl champion Eagles through most of the first half. Up 19-3, first-year coach Pat Shurmur was pushing all the right buttons and 37-year-old Eli Manning was making all the right throws in dominating a team that was already on the ropes at 4-6.
And then came the moment of convergence for the coach and the quarterback that turned the game around and effectively ended the Giants' flickering playoff hopes in a 25-22 loss.
Manning had driven the Giants to the Eagles' 27 with 19 seconds remaining in the half. Time for two more plays, either to get a touchdown to go ahead 26-11 or at least settle for a field goal and go into halftime with an 11-point lead.
Shurmur got aggressive against the Eagles' Cover 2 defense _ whose secondary was ravaged by injuries _ and called for Manning to throw deep over the middle to Odell Beckham Jr. As Manning faded back, safety Malcolm Jenkins drifted back toward the goal line to provide added pass protection and make sure Beckham wouldn't be open.
But Manning decided to heave the ball anyway, even although there was no room to complete the throw and running back Saquon Barkley was wide open in the left flat. Jenkins picked the ball off at the 2, dissipating all of the Giants' momentum.
The coach and the quarterback took the blame for what happened.
"I baited him into that," Shurmur said. "That's not on Eli. That's on me. (The Eagles) played way softer than I thought they would play."
"Just a bad decision, 100-percent bad decision on me," Manning said. "They were playing soft and I just have to throw that away and try for a long field goal."
The Giants never recovered. Manning, who threw for 236 yards and a touchdown before his interception, had only 61 passing yards in the second half and produced just one field goal.
A poor play call from the coach and a poor decision from the aging quarterback, who has made far too many of them in what likely will be his final season with the Giants.
Shurmur and Manning had rekindled some hope after back-to-back wins over the 49ers and Buccaneers. And it seemed at least plausible early in Sunday's game that the Giants were capable of beating the Eagles. Instead, poor performances from both men at the end of the second quarter and through the second half doomed their team.
Shurmur couldn't adequately explain why things went so haywire in the second half, other than to blame penalties and poor execution. But he was certainly guilty of questionable decision-making, particularly by barely using Barkley after the rookie had run for 94 yards and a touchdown in the first half. Barkley had just four carries for 7 yards and one catch for 4 in the second half.
Say what?
"The offensive coordinator (Mike Shula) and the head coach are coaches for a reason," said Barkley, who declined to second-guess the play-calling. "They know what they are doing and they're putting us in the position to win."
Sorry, Saquon. Not this time. There was simply no excuse not to stick with heavy doses of Barkley in the second half, especially after the Eagles had failed to contain him in the first. Shurmur's offense was stuck in quicksand after sustained early success, and it's on the coach for failing to find a way to continue it. Especially against a defense missing its three top cornerbacks because of injury.
Which leaves the Giants with almost no hope of making a run. Just getting to 8-8 requires them to win all of their remaining games.
Let's be real here. This team is not going to run the table. Not after blowing a chance to keep a spark of hope alive. Not after the coach and the quarterback flopped with the game _ and the season _ on the line.
