Giants eager to face Packers' secondary

Even the Giants' weakest link in the passing game sees plenty of opportunities in the Packers' secondary.

Tight end Travis Beckum has five receptions this season, but one of them was a 67-yard touchdown in the first quarter of the Giants' Dec. 4 loss to the Packers. He has been studying the Green Bay defense again for Sunday's NFC divisional playoff game, and, well, let's just say he has noticed a few things.

"I think the deep balls are there," Beckum said. "You look at their numbers, they're not very good at all. Whatever they’re weak at, we’re going to try to exploit it."

The Packers may be first in the league in wins with 15 but they finished the regular season ranked last in defense. What does that mean? Ask the team that finished at the bottom in rushing yardage this season and then rolled for 172 against the Falcons in the wild-card round. But it also means that the Giants see many possibilities for scoring points.

"I see a lot of people getting open when they're playing [the Packers]," Mario Manningham said. "That's the type of scheme their defense is. I don't want to say they gamble, but they play different coverages and leave different spots open."

If this game turns into a shootout -- like the 38-35 game a month ago was -- the Giants think this time they'll be the last ones standing. Especially if they can keep the ball away from the Packers' defenders. They may give up huge chunks of yardage -- 411.6 per game to be exact -- but they also lead the league with a plus-24 turnover ratio.

The Giants have gone the last two games without an offensive turnover. They have won their last eight games (seven regular season, one postseason) in which they did that.

"We've taken care of the ball," Tom Coughlin said. "We know how important that is. In the playoffs you have to take really good care of the ball and I think Eli's done a very good job of making sure that the opportunities that we've had to advance the ball, with the pass at least, the percentages have been in our favor."

The Giants are seeing nothing but favorable percentages. Beckum came just short of calling the Packers' defensive backs a bunch of stiffs.

"I don't know if it's necessarily double moves [that opponents are getting open on]," he said. "You just see guys flat-out getting beat. I don't know if it's miscommunication in the secondary, but at times you see guys just run past them."

"They like to gamble a lot, they like to take a lot of chances and risks, which means they either win or they lose big," Victor Cruz added. "We see the different areas that we can take advantage of and hopefully we can do that this Sunday."

So much is made of the Packers' glut of offensive options, but the Giants have plenty of threats as well. At different times this season they've been without Hakeem Nicks and Manningham and tight end Jake Ballard. Now, just like the defensive line, all of Manning's targets seem to be getting healthy at the same time.

"I think we can be very good because when everybody is rolling, when everybody is healthy, everybody is ready to go, it is hard to key in on one specific person," Cruz said. "In our offense we can hit you from different places, from different areas of the field with different personnel and different people. So anytime we can get everybody at full strength, or full health, this offense can be very dangerous."

Nicks used the same word to describe the receivers.

"We are a dangerous corps," he said.