Giants, Tom Coughlin feel at home on road

Jimmy Kennedy has been in the NFL since 2003. The Giants are his fifth team, and he's played for nearly twice that number of head coaches. He doesn't see any difference. Neither does Antrel Rolle, who came to the Giants from the Cardinals last season. According to them, the Giants do nothing out of the ordinary on the road.

They don't have a special routine. No magic mealtime. No extra pep talk.

It's the same philosophy and preparation as the other 31 teams in the league, apparently. But with one glaring exception.

They win.

Especially in the postseason under Tom Coughlin.

When the Giants beat the Packers on Sunday, it improved Coughlin's road playoff record to 6-4, which includes two runs to the AFC Championship Game with the Jaguars. It broke a tie with Joe Gibbs for second for road playoff wins by coaches.

If the Giants win against the 49ers in San Francisco on Sunday, Coughlin will move into first place with Tom Landry, who also won seven playoff games on the road. Technically, he'd be better than Landry, who was 7-7. Coughlin would be 7-4.

"I think it's just a mind-set," Kennedy said. "I think it's just the confidence of the team . . . It's just about handling adversity and going to get it done."

Bringing attention to it helps. Last week, Coughlin told the media that the term "Road Warriors" was "coming out of the woodwork." After the upset at Lambeau Field, he noted "we were back to the 'Road Warriors' theme." It was such an integral part of the mentality of the 2007 team that those words are inscribed on their Super Bowl rings.

There have been eight games this postseason. The home team has won all but one: Giants 37, Packers 20.

"Time to go on the road, renew some of those thoughts about playing on the road," Coughlin said when asked to describe what it means to be a Road Warrior. "The togetherness, the team, the all-for-one, the one-for-all, the mental toughness."

There's an odd mix that allows coaches to win road playoff games. They have to have teams good enough to get into the playoffs and make some noise, but not so good that they are rewarded with home games. In the last few years, New York football has seen a lot of that type of play.

This is the fourth time in the last five seasons that either the Giants or Jets will be playing for a conference championship. But in all four of those runs, they have combined for one home playoff game. That came this month, when the Giants won the NFC East and hosted the Falcons. The only time in the last five years that New York was not represented in a conference championship game was after the 2008 season. That year, the Giants were the NFC's top seed but were bounced in the divisional round by the Eagles.

Coughlin isn't the only one who would be able to lay claim to the title King of the Road with a win Sunday. Eli Manning has four road playoff wins, and according to the Elias Sports Bureau, he's in a six-way tie for first with Hall of Famers Len Dawson and Roger Staubach, along with Jake Delhomme, Mark Sanchez and Joe Flacco.

Manning and Flacco are quarterbacking road teams in the conference championships this Sunday. If both win, they'll be tied atop the list with five each.

The Super Bowl may be played in Indianapolis, but the teams that get that far are neither home nor on the road. The Road Warrior mentality will not apply. Perhaps Coughlin, Manning and the Giants will become the Neutral Site Ninjas.