EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) — Coming off one of their best defensive efforts, the New York Giants seemingly are getting another piece back for their NFC East showdown with the Dallas Cowboys.

Two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Osi Umenyiora practiced on a limited basis Wednesday after being sidelined for the month with a high ankle sprain and continuing problems with his knee.

Expect him on the field Sunday night when the Giants (8-7) face the Cowboys (8-7) for the division title and a first-round home game against either Atlanta or Detroit.

“Hey, this is it,” backup defensive end Dave Tollefson said. “Win, you’re in. Lose, you go home. So you might as well pull all the stops and get everybody rolling,”

Umenyiora hurt the ankle – the team has not said which one – in a loss in New Orleans on Nov. 28. He has missed the last four games and many wondered whether he would be back on the field this season.

However, the nine-year veteran looked nimble running with the defensive linemen early in practice.

“He’s tested everything, lots of times,” coach Tom Coughlin said. “That’s what he’s been doing. He’s been working his tail off. He just hasn’t been able to get right.”

Umenyiora did not immediately return an email from The Associated Press seeking comment. He usually talks to reporters on Fridays.

The Giants have not been hurt by Umenyiora’s absence because second-year pro and recent Pro Bowl selection Jason Pierre-Paul has been outstanding starting for him at right end, twice winning NFC defensive player of the week honors.

However, Umenyiora’s addition also comes at a time when fellow two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Justin Tuck is playing his best football after a season marked by neck, groin and toe injuries.

With Umenyiora, Pierre-Paul, Tuck and Mathias Kiwanuka, the Giants will finally have all the part of the third-down pass quartet they envisioned using all season. And some depth.

Pierre-Paul was forced to play more than 100 plays in the Giants’ 29-14 win over the rival Jets at MetLife Stadium.

“That rest will help me a lot and it will get me going,” said Pierre-Paul, who was selected the NFC defensive player of the week on Wednesday for the second time in three weeks. “I was playing like 80 snaps a game and that is a lot. You don’t really think about it, you just have to go.”

Pierre-Paul also won the honor in the Giants 37-34 win over Dallas on Dec. 11. He had eight tackles, two sacks, one of which resulted in a safety, a forced fumble that led to a field goal and blocked Dan Bailey’s tying field goal attempt on the final play of the game.

If the Giants do have everybody back that could make things a little tougher for Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo, who intends to play this weekend despite suffering a bruised right hand in 20-7 loss to Philadelphia this past weekend.

“I think that Osi is a good player, so anytime they get another pass rusher it presents more of a challenge,” Romo said in a conference call with New York media. “We have to prepare for that. I think that group up front is an outstanding group and they have three or four guys that you really have to account for. It is going to be a great challenge for our guys up front and for me to see different things and you just have to know that going into the week. We will be prepared for it.”

The Giants’ defense, which ranks 28th in the league, played an outstanding game against the Jets, particularly after yielding a touchdown on the opening drive. It forced three turnovers and held the Jets to 4 of 21 on third-down conversions. The only Jets touchdown in the second half came on an 11-yard drive after an Eli Manning pass was intercepted.

Safety Antrel Rolle said the Giants are willing to pay the price to make the playoffs for the first time since 2008. Nicked players are practicing and the tempo has picked up.

Having Umenyiora back on the field is just another example of that.

“All on deck. We’re all fighting,” Rolle said. “We’re all trying to get better. It means everything to have Osi out there. I know he’s probably not 100 percent, but he’s fighting. He’s fighting. He’s fighting for himself. He’s fighting for this team. He’s fighting for what we have at stake.”

Tackle Chris Canty said having Umenyiora and his seven sacks back just gives the defense another talented player.

“It would be pretty impeccable timing, to get everyone healthy and running,” Tollefson said.

NOTES: WR Hakeem Nicks did not practice because of a recurring hamstring injury. He said he would play Sunday. …WR Mario Manningham, who missed the Jets game with a nagging season-long knee injury, worked on a limited basis. …TE Jake Ballard, who sprained a knee against Washington on Dec. 18 and did not play last week, did some running and light cutting away from the team. He did practice. ….Coughlin, who injured his left leg on Saturday when slammed into by running back D.J. Ware, got a message from Saints coach Sean Payton, who broke his left leg when tight end Jimmy Graham slammed into him on Oct. 16 in a game at Tampa, Fla. “You look like you’re a better athlete than me, you didn’t go down,” Coughlin said Payton told him.

Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. – Coming off one of their best defensive efforts, the New York Giants seemingly are getting another piece back for their NFC East showdown with the Dallas Cowboys.

Two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Osi Umenyiora practised on a limited basis Wednesday after being sidelined for the month with a high ankle sprain and continuing problems with his knee.

Expect him on the field Sunday night when the Giants (8-7) face the Cowboys (8-7) for the division title and a first-round home game against either Atlanta or Detroit.

“Hey, this is it,” backup defensive end Dave Tollefson said. “Win, you’re in. Lose, you go home.

“So you might as well pull all the stops and get everybody rolling.”

Umenyiora hurt the ankle — the team has not said which one — in a loss in New Orleans on Nov. 28. He has missed the last four games and many wondered whether he would be back on the field this season.

However, the nine-year veteran looked nimble running with the defensive linemen early in practice.

“He’s tested everything, lots of times,” coach Tom Coughlin said. “That’s what he’s been doing. He’s been working his tail off.

“He just hasn’t been able to get right.”

Umenyiora did not immediately return an email from The Associated Press seeking comment. He usually talks to reporters on Fridays.

The Giants have not been hurt by Umenyiora’s absence because second-year pro and recent Pro Bowl selection Jason Pierre-Paul has been outstanding starting for him at right end, twice winning NFC defensive player of the week honours.

However, Umenyiora’s addition also comes at a time when fellow two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Justin Tuck is playing his best football after a season marked by neck, groin and toe injuries.

With Umenyiora, Pierre-Paul, Tuck and Mathias Kiwanuka, the Giants will finally have all the part of the third-down pass quartet they envisioned using all season. And some depth.

Pierre-Paul was forced to play more than 100 plays in the Giants’ 29-14 win over the rival Jets at MetLife Stadium.

“That rest will help me a lot and it will get me going,” said Pierre-Paul, who was selected the NFC defensive player of the week Wednesday for the second time in three weeks. “I was playing like 80 snaps a game and that is a lot.

“You don’t really think about it, you just have to go.”

Pierre-Paul also won the honour in the Giants 37-34 win over Dallas on Dec. 11. He had eight tackles, two sacks, one of which resulted in a safety, a forced fumble that led to a field goal and blocked Dan Bailey’s tying field goal attempt on the final play of the game.

If the Giants do have everybody back that could make things a little tougher for Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo, who intends to play this weekend despite suffering a bruised right hand in 20-7 loss to Philadelphia this past weekend.

“I think that Osi is a good player, so anytime they get another pass rusher it presents more of a challenge,” Romo said in a conference call with New York media. “We have to prepare for that. I think that group up front is an outstanding group and they have three or four guys that you really have to account for.

“It is going to be a great challenge for our guys up front and for me to see different things and you just have to know that going into the week. We will be prepared for it.”

The Giants’ defence, which ranks 28th in the league, played an outstanding game against the Jets, particularly after yielding a touchdown on the opening drive. It forced three turnovers and held the Jets to 4-of-21 on third-down conversions. The only Jets touchdown in the second half came on an 11-yard drive after an Eli Manning pass was intercepted.

Safety Antrel Rolle said the Giants are willing to pay the price to make the playoffs for the first time since 2008. Nicked players are practising and the tempo has picked up.

Having Umenyiora back on the field is just another example of that.

“All on deck. We’re all fighting,” Rolle said. “We’re all trying to get better. It means everything to have Osi out there. I know he’s probably not 100 per cent, but he’s fighting.

“He’s fighting. He’s fighting for himself. He’s fighting for this team. He’s fighting for what we have at stake.”

Tackle Chris Canty said having Umenyiora and his seven sacks back just gives the defence another talented player.

“It would be pretty impeccable timing, to get everyone healthy and running,” Tollefson said.

NOTES: WR Hakeem Nicks did not practise because of a recurring hamstring injury. He said he would play Sunday. …WR Mario Manningham, who missed the Jets game with a nagging season-long knee injury, worked on a limited basis. …TE Jake Ballard, who sprained a knee against Washington on Dec. 18 and did not play last week, did some running and light cutting away from the team. He did practise. ….Coughlin, who injured his left leg Saturday when slammed into by running back D.J. Ware, got a message from Saints coach Sean Payton, who broke his left leg when tight end Jimmy Graham slammed into him Oct. 16 in a game at Tampa, Fla. “You look like you’re a better athlete than me, you didn’t go down,” Coughlin said Payton told him.

There seems to be a growing disconnect between New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin and his players. According to a New York Daily News report, Coughlin called out Giants cornerback Antrel Rolle for saying that his teammates lacked heart in a 23-10 loss to the Washington Redskins on Dec. 18. “I’m sure there’s frustration there,” Coughlin said of Rolle’s comments. “I don’t think that’s the mechanism by which you express your frustration.”

Are the New York Giants still playing hard for Coughlin? That’s the burning question that will be answered in the Giants’ stretch run of the season, in two must-win games against the New York Jets and Dallas Cowboys.

At Justin Tuck’s post-game press conference following the loss to the Redskins, he said “a lack of sustained intensity” was a good way of describing the New York Giants’ performance during the game. “We came out and had a pick in the first play of the game, but we weren’t able to create any momentum on offense after that,” Tuck noted.

The lack of intensity during the game seemed to carry over into the post-game conferences, at a time when the Giants should have shown anger or at least more emotion following such a disastrous loss.

Not that they didn’t seem to care, but they didn’t look like a team that was truly upset about losing, or hungry to bounce back and make a playoff run.

New York running back Brandon Jacobs was asked at the press conference if he thought the Giants played with emotion and passion, and he said they did not. “We didn’t want it bad enough the first time we played these guys,” Jacobs said. “And we didn’t want it bad enough this time.”

Jacobs later added that he couldn’t answer why the passion wasn’t there. “For whatever reason, why we came out and played the way we did, I can’t answer that,” Jacobs said. “We have two good teams that are coming up and we have to be on our feet.”

The responsibility of getting a team to play with emotion and passion should fall squarely on a coach’s shoulders, and it looks more and more like Tom Coughlin’s message isn’t getting through to his team like it once was.

Following the loss to the Redskins, coach Coughlin said he was extremely disappointed with the way his team played. “The responsibility comes back to me, and I accept it,” Coughlin noted. “I told the players ‘I expected to see more. I expected to see quality execution and quite frankly, we didn’t get much of that.”

Eric Holden is a lifelong New York resident and fan of both New York football teams. Follow him on Twitter @ericholden.

Sources

www.giants.com, Giants, press conference videos and player quotes

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EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Pulling off the improbable, the Washington Redskins went up to MetLife Stadium and overcame an ugly start against the NFC East-leading New York Giants to come away with a 23-10 victory Sunday afternoon.

It was the Redskins’ fifth win and, in beating the Giants for a second time this season, Washington registered the first sweep of its division rival since 1999.

“The Giants, they’ve really been our nemesis around here the last five years,” said Redskins linebacker London Fletcher, whose team had fallen to New York nine of the last 10 games entering this season. “To sweep them, it means a lot, because they’re a well-coached football team.”

With quarterback Rex Grossman
turning in a shaky performance, the Redskins relied heavily on their defense. Washington intercepted Giants quarterback Eli Manning three times, winning the turnover battle for the first time all season.

And when Manning went to work in the final quarter — aiming for his seventh fourth-quarter comeback victory of the season — the Redskins twice denied the Giants in the shadow of their own end zone.

Manning finished the game 23 for 40 for 257 yards and no touchdowns. Ahmad Bradshaw led New York in rushing with 10 carries for 58 yards and a touchdown.

Grossman connected on 15 of 24 passes for 185 yards and a touchdown but threw two interceptions. Roy Helu’s streak of three 100-yard rushing games came to an end as the rookie picked up 53 yards on 23 carries while Evan Royster added 36 yards on 10 carries. Jabar Gaffney led Washington with six catches for 85 yards.

“You feel good about the way they played,” Coach Mike Shanahan said of his team, which had lost two straight and last week fell short in a last-second bid to upset the New England Patriots. “I was really disappointed that we couldn’t close the door last week. . . . So to finish the way we did today was nice.”

Washington’s first defining goal-line stand came three minutes into the fourth quarter. After the Redskins extended their lead to 23-3 with 14 minutes 57 seconds left, the Giants finally started showing signs of life. Manning completed four straight passes to march his team to the Redskins 13-yard line.

But on his fifth pass attempt, Manning’s fortunes changed. Redskins cornerback Josh Wilson made a leaping catch in the end zone for an interception and touchback. It was Wilson’s second interception of the season, and his second straight game with a pick.

The Redskins’ defense answered the bell again later in the fourth quarter. Wilson made a strong tackle to deny Giants running back D.J. Ware as he caught a pass and tried to cross the goal line. Initially, the officials ruled the play a touchdown. But a review showed that Ware had bobbled the ball at the line and didn’t secure possession until Wilson wrestled him back the 2.

With the Giants facing fourth and goal from there, Redskins linebacker Brian Orakpo rushed from the edge and drew a holding call from tackle David Diehl, backing the Giants up to the 12-yard line. New York tried for a touchdown on the next play, but rookie linebacker Ryan Kerrigan sacked Manning to deny the Giants and register Washington’s first sack of the game.

The Tim Tebow Train has left a lot of other great stories sitting on the tracks this NFL season. True, Tebow has managed to captivate the country with his improbable comebacks in leading the Broncos to six consecutive victories and into first place in the AFC West.

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But look at some of the other magic being created by quarterbacks around the league. Thanks mainly to Aaron Rodgers, who already has tied Brett Favre’s single-season touchdown record with 37, the Packers are just three wins away from a perfect 16-0 regular season.

Drew Brees of the Saints is on pace to obliterate Dan Marino’s single-season, passing yardage record of 5,084. Brees leads the NFL with 4,368 yards and needs to average just 240 yards down the stretch to break it. New England’s Tom Brady (4,373) and Rodgers (4,125) are also on pace to better Marino.

Carolina’s Cam Newton, meanwhile, needs just 167 passing yards to best Peyton Manning’s NFL rookie record (3,739).

And then we have the Giants’ Eli Manning, who has almost managed to get lost in the shuffle — and that’s nearly impossible for a quarterback playing in New York.

His 4,105 passing yards are just 20 yards fewer than Rodgers, who seems to be the unanimous lock for Most Valuable Player honors. That Manning is in position to also break Marino’s 27-year-old mark certainly puts him in some very elite company.

Even if he doesn’t catch Marino, Eli needs to average just 200 passing yards in his final three games to surpass brother Peyton’s best passing season ever — 4,700 yards just a year ago.

And say what you want about Tebow and his fourth-quarter comebacks, but no one has been better than Eli Manning this season.

He’s directed his team to six victories in the final 15 minutes and in five of those, the Giants trailed. He’s also thrown 14 fourth-quarter touchdown passes, tying the NFL record set by Johnny Unitas in 1959 and matched by his big brother in 2006.

“The great ones can do that and he has stepped up his game,” said Redskins head coach Mike Shanahan, whose team meets Manning and the Giants on today. “He has eliminated his mistakes and that’s what separates the great ones.”

Eli already has a Super Bowl ring, which he won in Glendale by beating the then-undefeated Patriots in Super Bowl XLII. And he certainly had elevated his game. But when did we get to the point where we could start calling him “great?”

Manning raised some eyebrows in the preseason when he self-proclaimed himself an elite quarterback among the likes of Brady. Well, he’s backing up his words with a pretty incredible year, even though he isn’t getting enough credit for it.

“I don’t ever feel pressure when I’m playing football,” Manning told reporters last week. “I know my assignments. I’m reading the defense, I know my plays and I try to get the ball into my receivers’ hands. It’s exciting, it’s fun. I’m competitive and I’m out there doing what I can to get a win.”

Manning was his late-game heroic self last week in another come-from-behind win, this one at division-rival Dallas. He passed for 400 yards and led his team on two touchdown drives in the final 3:14 to help topple the Cowboys 37-34.

The victory vaulted the Giants back into the NFC East lead and snapped a nasty four-game slide that almost tore the team apart. They can’t let up now, not against a very beatable Washington team, or Manning’s impressive season won’t mean anything.

Manning knows that as well as anyone.

“We can’t relax now,” he said. “We can’t start feeling great about ourselves. We have three big games left. Washington is coming to New York and we have to win that game and go from there.”

The Redskins beat the Giants in the season opener, but Antrel Rolle, New York’s talkative safety, boldly predicted last week that the Giants would beat the Redskins 99 times out of 100.

That didn’t sit well with the Redskins and it probably didn’t make Rolle’s teammates or coaches happy, either.

“It’s the NFL and nobody is going to beat anyone 99 out of 100 times,” Redskins quarterback Rex Grossman said during a conference call.

If the Giants beat Washington, they can actually afford a loss next week at the Jets and still win the division so long as they beat the Cowboys at home in Week 17.

If they do, it likely will be because of Manning, who has managed to find himself overshadowed in this season of the quarterbacks.