Saquon Barkley's rookie season has been a leap year

Looking back, Saquon Barkley said, he probably could have simply walked into the end zone rather than launching himself high into the air, ball extended in his right hand, and scoring a dramatic late touchdown against the Cowboys on Sunday.

Some offensive linemen kidded him about that on Monday when they watched the video of it together before cleaning out their lockers. “The offensive line did a really good job of blocking,” the rookie running back said. “They were like, ‘You don’t think you could have just walked in there?’ We just laughed about it.

But I kind of made up in my mind that by any means, I’m going to score. Something in my body said, ‘Jump,’ and I was able to jump.”

The touchdown, on a third-and-goal from the Dallas 2, gave the Giants a 32-28 lead late in a game they went on to lose, 36-35. It was a fitting cap to Barkley’s spectacular debut season, but he saw in it a lesson, too. “In that situation, it worked out for me,” he said. “We scored a touchdown. But that’s not the right time to do it. I think the down and distance was third down. That’s something you do if it’s fourth down and a critical moment.”

The lack of ball security involved in the play was too great a risk, he said. In fact, Cowboys linebacker Joe Thomas hit his forearm and dislodged the ball, but only after he had crossed the plane of the goal line — barely. “That was too close to call,’’ he said. “I’ve definitely got to be smarter. But at the end the day, it did work.”

The play inspired a number of memes on the Internet. Barkley said the funniest he saw imagined him as Michael Jordan in “Space Jam.”

“I try to stay away from it, but I’m not going to sit here and lie to you [reporters],” he said. “I’m on social media. You guys are on social media. Everybody is on social media. You’re going to see the good things and you’re going to see the bad things. It’s how you handle it.”

Barkley was denied one last chance to make something happen when the Giants’ last possession resulted in four incomplete passes from their 48-yard line, none to Barkley.

“It’s tough because of how I’m made up and how I was raised,” he said. “I want to be that guy to make that play for my teammates . . . That’s just how I’ve always been and I’m always going to be. But at the end of the day, you have to trust your teammates to make plays, too.

“I know they’re going to make those plays. Sometimes you fall short. That game right there and that drive there, we fell short. We did that too many times this season. We have to find a way to be better.”

By Neil Best

neil.best@newsday.com@sportswatch

Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.