On Second Thought: Finishing the Giants

via Steelers.com
Tomorrow we will look in depth at the Bills, but there were some loose threads from last Sunday’s game I want to finish up.
I gave a fair number of stats for the Giants because they struck me as so unusual for a team on a six-game winning streak. For instance, the number of first downs vs. those of their opponents. Prior to Sunday’s game they had 203 first downs, which was actually 15 less than the 218 by their opponents. The game at Heinz field was no different, as the Giants had 16 first downs, the Steelers 20. Not too surprising in a loss.
But if you look at the play-by-play, half of their first downs came in the fourth quarter, five of the eight in “garbage time”—with less than a minute and a half left in the game. And two of the five were by penalty—a pass interference on Ross Cockrell and an Unnecessary Roughness on Stephon Tuitt. More on the penalties later…