Giants believe they're ready for battle

It's been three years since the Giants' most recent playoff appearance, and there are many new players on the team who never have experienced the intensity of postseason play.

At least not technically.

Tom Coughlin said the last month of the season -- which included one virtual do-or-die game against the Jets and an actual do-or-die game against the Cowboys -- has prepared the team for a run at the Super Bowl, which begins Sunday against the Falcons.

"I think we've been in playoff games; we've been in playoff games for the last three weeks," he said. "We are battle-tested in a lot of ways."

General manager Jerry Reese used the same phrase to describe the team Sunday night after the Giants' clinching 31-14 win over Dallas.

"It's a whole different ballgame now. It's a different level when playoff time rolls around," Reese said. "We're battle-tested. We've had a tough schedule . . . Last couple of weeks, it's basically been win or go home. You can call it the playoffs if you want to. But now it's the real playoffs. We're raring to go."

The Giants head into the real playoffs with as much confidence as they've had at any time this season. It's bringing back plenty of memories of the attitude they had four seasons ago, when they not only made a run but won the Super Bowl.

"The 2007 team had their own identity, their moments, and hopefully, this 2011 team can have its identity, its moments," Justin Tuck said. "We're not the same team we were in '07 and I'm not going to try to say that we are. But we have a lot of similarities and we can do a lot of the things we did in '07. Hopefully, we can get on that run."

Not everyone is so willing to embrace the parallels: a team no one believed in; a team that appears to be getting hot at the right time; a team that has won enough games to save its coach's job and now is looking to secure his legacy even further.

"We're going to try not to compare right now," Eli Manning said Sunday. "We have a lot of guys on this team who weren't here in '07 and don't know, so this is a whole new year and a whole new situation and we have to enjoy this."

But even Coughlin, who believes that every team and every season is different -- whether it's talking about second-half slides or Lombardi Trophies -- seems willing to embrace the 2007 achievements. In fact, he used it to his advantage during the second half of this season.

"We have some people here that know how to win, that have done it in a very, very wonderful place not too long ago, that can share with a lot of others about what it takes at this time of the year to put yourself in that position or at least to get into the tournament," Coughlin said.

Brandon Jacobs first drew the comparison Sunday.

"I would not want to face the New York Giants in the playoffs right now," he said. "I got the same feeling [as in 2007]. There's a lot of guys that are here that weren't a couple of years ago when we went [to the Super Bowl], but it's the same kind of feeling that I have."

Coughlin said he hopes those premonitions are correct.

"I think the guys that are probably saying that are the guys that have experienced it," he said. "If they can share that feeling with the other players and the other players can understand what they're talking about, I'm all for it."