Giants must forget Jets, focus on Dallas

They're the Kings of New York. Now they want to be Kings of the NFC East.

The stirring 29-14 win over the Jets on Saturday gave the Giants bragging rights to call themselves the "big brother" team in the area. It also propelled them back into first place in the division, even if it is by tenuous technicality. Their victory, coupled with the Cowboys' loss to the Eagles later Saturday, left both teams with 8-7 records and on a collision course for a Sunday night showdown.

The winner claims the title and hosts a wild-card game the next weekend. The loser's season ends on the field at MetLife Stadium. This may not be a playoff game, but it might as well be.

Which is why Tom Coughlin, still half-wincing from his leg injury suffered on the sideline and half-grinning from one of his biggest regular-season wins with the Giants, quickly changed the focus at his postgame news conference.

"To be honest with you, we need to put this one aside as fast as we can and go to work on Dallas with the same attitude we had last week," he said.

If only it were that simple. This year's Giants have a history of ups and downs, wild mood swings in terms of in-game intensity and performance. It was just two weeks ago Sunday, remember, that they were riding high after a road win in Dallas and all of their issues appeared to be fixed. Then they lost at home to the playing-for-pride Redskins with a dull performance and bounced back against the Jets.

Now they have an all-or-nothing game against the rival Cowboys, a game that already has been flexed for a national television audience. Do the Giants even know for sure that they'll come out fired up?

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"We don't," defensive captain Justin Tuck said glumly. "All I can say is we have a blueprint on how to do it and we need to come out and do it. Can I promise you we'll come out and show that passion? I wish I could. I wish I could tell you exactly what's going to happen [Sunday]. But I can't."

Bummer.

"I can promise you that I'm going to do my part to let the team know that I'm all in,'' Tuck said, "and hopefully we come out and give the effort that we gave [Saturday]."

Tuck's gloomy realism was not echoed by everyone on the team. Linebacker Mathias Kiwanuka said he sees no way the Giants lose the feeling they had leading up to the Jets game.

"Not at this point," he said. "We're a different team. We're moving forward and we're looking for that playoff push."

Even Giants owner John Mara seemed to think the win over the Jets was somehow transformative, a kind of turning point. "It reinvigorates this franchise and these players and gives them something to play for next week," he said in the locker room Saturday.

Defensive lineman Chris Canty noted that the win over the Jets is not the "end-all, be-all" for the Giants. "We have to improve, we have to continue to get better as a team," Canty said. "What better time to be playing your best football?"

Than Sunday night at 8:20? There couldn't possibly be any other.