Detroit Lions

New York Giants: Big Blue's Defense Stops Another Potent Threat

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 12:46 p.m. ET

Fansided, Nafisa H/FanSided via NFL Spin Zone

In a game with playoff implications for both the New York Giants and the Detroit Lions, the Matthew Stafford-led offense was no match for Big Blue’s defense.

It took a few weeks for the New York Giants newly rebuilt defense to click. However, as 2x Super Bowl champion and former Giant Justin Tuck accurately predicted, the pieces of the puzzle fit together and chemistry ultimately developed, allowing the unit to succeed.

Big Blue’s defense isn’t just succeeding, though; it’s straight-up balling out! The Giants unit that ranked dead last at the end of the 2015 season has risen to become the 14th-ranked defense with two regular season games to go. The improvement is attributable, in large part, to the $200 million that Jerry Reese and company spent on acquiring free agents Olivier Vernon, Janoris “Jackrabbit” Jenkins and Damon “Snacks” Harrison.

Mix the new with the the “old” and you have a recipe for disaster. The Lions were served a big portion of this on Sunday when the Giants defense held the team’s offense to a measly six points (the fewest points scored by Detroit all season) and ended their five-game winning streak.

More from NFL Spin Zone

Impressingly, the New York Giants managed to stifle the Lions without leader Jason Pierre-Paul (sidelined as he recovers from surgery for a hernia) and arguably the team’s best defensive player this season Janoris Jenkins, who left the game early in the second quarter with a back injury.

The Giants, who are currently the top-ranked red zone defense, kept the Lions out of the end zone all three times they reached the red zone. In the second quarter, Leon Hall forced Detroit’s Zach Zenner to fumble and Olivier Vernon swooped in for the recovery in the end zone, preventing the Lions from narrowing the Giants’ 7-3 lead. Then, New York forced Detroit to settle for a field goal. Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie (who replaced Janoris Jenkins) sealed the deal and put the final dagger in the Lions when he intercepted Matthew Stafford in the end zone near the two-minute warning with the Giants leading 17-6.

The Giants defense laid it all out on the field and played their hearts out for a potential playoff berth. Like the 2011-12 Super Bowl team, they’re all-in and determined to not only to keep winning, but to prove that they are one of the League’s best defenses.