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Giants Players React to Big Win

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Chris Snee, Offensive Line #76

"We knew we just had to score quickly on the first one and then hope to get the ball back. That's exactly how it played out…When we got the ball the second time, there was no doubt in my mind we were going to go down and score."

On what Eli said during the last drive: "He was just calm in place. Everyone's aware of the situation, the circumstance and what's at stake in this game. He didn't even say anything. He just called the play and we went up to the line and blocked it up…He was cool."

"It feels great. This is a very, very satisfying win. We're going to enjoy this and come Wednesday ready to work. We're going to enjoy this for a day or so. What we overcame against that team speaks the loudest."

On Brandon Jacobs: "We've been saying all year that we need the running game…Our passing game has been carrying us all year. We know that, especially when the weather gets tough at home and where we play on the road, we'll need to be able to run the ball. It was great. He ran the ball hard and broke a lot of tackles."

On if Eli still amazes him: "At this point, absolutely not. He won us a Super Bowl with more pressure than this. I'm not amazed, I'm just thankful to have him."

"It feels great…just to get back in the win column. Losing streaks are, I mean, they weigh on you. It's just one of those things where you have to come in every Wednesday and have a new mindset and new focus on the opponent at hand. But it's a lot easier to watch the tape and make corrections after you win the game."

Henry Hyanoski, Fullback #45

On the running backs: "We can put any one of them in the game and pound them. We know they are going to be productive. With some push up front, we know these guys can make plays with anyone else around the league. It's fantastic to have that behind you."

Victor Cruz, Wide Receiver #80

On Cowboys 3-and-out: "As soon as I saw him let it go, I knew it was overthrown. But Miles was catching up to it a little bit. I was just happy that he overthrew it and it gave us another chance."

"It was huge. It was huge for our confidence. It was huge for our momentum going into these next three. We understand the position we are in. We understand we've got to win these games and carry this momentum through the rest of the season and god willing, into the postseason."

On the mindset of the  last drives: "I'm just thinking that we've just got to keep doing what we're doing. Offensively, just keep plugging away. Understand what we have to do and that we are not out of it. We've been in this position before and go down and do what we have to do."

On Eli Manning: "The guy is just a top notch performer in every sense of the word as far as his work ethic, understanding defenses, understanding where he wants us and just getting all of us on the same page. He's an incredible athlete. His mind is moving a mile a minute and he understands everything he sees…He sees things going on before we can."

On Eli on the last drive: "He just comes up with the play and gives everybody what they have. It's just routine, normal stuff."

Kevin Boothe, Offensive Line #77

"The big thing is that we realized we couldn't get the 11 points we needed on one drive. So, we just focused on getting one score. Once we got that, we got the defensive stop. We looked up and there was still a couple minutes left. That's more than enough time for us to get another touchdown. I think everyone was confident. We realized that we could get that one and figure things out after that…I don't think there was anybody on our sideline that didn't think we wouldn't score."

On the Dallas offsides that saved a big loss: "That was a bad snap on my part. We caught a break on that one. Sometimes it's good to have a little work. That could have been very bad…I'll get better."

Hakeem Nicks, Wide Receiver #88

"We were definitely in a hurry up offense mentality slash two minute mentality. We knew what we were capable of doing. We'd been in that position  many times this season. So, we want to go down and get the job done and leave time for the defense to stop them."

"I think the whole team did a good job of believing in each other and believing in ourselves. We went out there, stayed confident and got the W."

"When you're going down to the wire, anyone can take it. I think our confidence in ourselves always is high. We know what we are capable of doing offensively."

#90 Jason Pierre-Paul (DE)

On the timeout called on the final kick: "I didn't even know it was a timeout.  I thought we were going into overtime.  I guess coach called a timeout.  He did the best thing for the team.  The second field goal, well, you saw what happened last week, too."

On the second kick, which he blocked:  "The first one, the guard blocked me.  He's a strong cat, you know?  He was heavy; I couldn't push him.  So the second one, I was like, man I have to push through the center to at least try to get the blocked kick.  I gave great effort and I blocked the kick. … I didn't go through the guard.  I stepped left and blocked through the center. … It felt good.  I knew we weren't going into overtime!"

On the blocked kick: "I blocked it.  We're not going to overtime, so that is a good thing."

On the safety:  "I was just playing my game. I was faster than the quarterback, and I got him. I slung him down, but he didn't quite go down.  And then we were in the end zone, and he took a knee.  And I had a safety.  I didn't even know I had a safety until everybody started throwing their hands up."

#26 Antrel Rolle (S)

On Jason Pierre-Paul's block of the field goal attempt:  "He has been coming through for us all day.  He has been an outstanding player all season.  A lot of key plays, huge plays for us today, momentum changing plays.  And he came up big at the end.  I don't expect anything different from him.  I take my hat off to that guy.  I take my hat off to the offense, all day.  They did an outstanding job all day.  Those guys were relentless.  We played together as a team."

On whether the blocked field goal was the play of the season:  "It was a play of the day.  It helped us out today.  We won today, and we look forward to Washington next week."

On the season, so far: "We've had a rough month.  Last month was very rough.  But last month was last month.  We are looking forward to bigger and better things.  If you win the month of December, you are giving yourself a chance at the postseason."

On being in first place in the NFC East:  "Once we stay there [in first place] and get to the postseason, then it will feel good.  But right now we are going to take it as it is, and make sure we keep it there."

On the team's fight:  "It is either fight or flight.  We are definitely a fighting team.  Flight is nowhere in our vocabulary.  We came together when we needed to, we made the plays we needed to.  And I definitely take my hat off to the offense.  Those guys were outstanding out there today.  Once again, Eli comes through for us, the receivers come through, the running backs come through, the O Line comes through.  Those guys were extremely special today.  And JPP [Jason Pierre-Paul] singlehandedly handled them today.  You take your hat off to a guy like that.  I always call it beast mode, and h e was in beast mode today.

#94 Mathias Kiwanuka (LB)

On the close finishes:  "We'd rather win in a better fashion, but as long as we're getting the W's, we'll take it.  These kind of games have gone the other way.  So if we're going to battle, we'd rather just come out with a win."

On breaking a losing streak:  "It has been tough.  We always said we still have all of our goals in our sights, and we are still climbing back up the mountain. We made it hard for ourselves.  But we still have the ability to achieve all our goals, so we are going for it."

On the importance of the win:  "It was huge.  I don't think it was anything about breaking the losing streak that we were concerned about.  I think it as more about getting that division lead and being able to go down the rest of the season and have our destiny in our hands.  I think that was the most important part for us."

#99 Chris Canty (DT)

On the win:  "This football team just knew we needed to win a football game.  We just needed to win a game.  And to come down here into Dallas, we knew it was going to be a 60-minute, hard-fought, black-and-blue type of football game.  And I think today we just made enough plays to win the game."

27 Brandon Jacobs – RB

How sweet is this win? Sweet, man.  It was a tough game – a tough fought game.  We had a lot of guys that hung in there.  Guys did exactly what they were supposed to do and we came away with the game.

When it was 34-22, five minutes left in the game, what are you thinking?  I mean, you know at that point, we have a great quarterback that can make plays like that.  If you ask me, he's the best in the business when our backs are against the wall and we need to score.  He's never let me down.  I believe in him.  I believe in our offense.  I believe in our coaches and he got it done.When did you find out Ahmad (Bradshaw) wasn't going to play?  He didn't start?  I didn't know.  I didn't know anything about it to be honest with you, man.

Talk about the significance of the losing streak, first place and how badly you guys needed to win. You know, of course, you've got a four-game losing streak.  It was a terrible month for us.  After a four-game losing streak and still being in it, you know, to take the lead in the division, that's a special thing.  We're a good football team and we've got a long stretch down the line and we've got some good teams and it's not over for us.  We're going to have to play ball.  No one's going to lay down for us and we've got to play ball.

You talked about how sweet it is as a team.  How sweet is it personally to be able to be able to carry the load like that? I felt great.  The line came off.  Eli got us in plays that we were supposed to be in and you know, they moved people and when someone made contact with me, I tried to move them.  That's basically what the game was about.

Talk about the carry where you hurdled the guy, bouncing outside.  You know I've never done something like that.  That was my first time ever doing something like that.  So, I didn't know whether he was gonna hit me low or what. But whatever he did, I tried to jump as high as I can to clear him no matter what he did, so I actually surprised myself.

How would you sum up what this win signifies about this team? Well, you know, it's a hard-nosed team – a hard hat team and we play hard had games.  This is what we do.  We put ourselves in this position, you know, to be down like this and we've got enough character in our locker room and our coaching staff to clean it up.

You lifted up Coach Coughlin after the New England game.  What was it like in the locker room after this win? The intensity in there was really high, but given the game I just had and the tough sledding it was, I didn't try to lift him up at all.

Does the confidence of the team swell after last week and after tonight?  You know, last week, we had a good – Green Bay we a good football team.  We had no doubt that we could put points on those guys, and that gave us a lot of confidence, you know, that we could play with anybody, and that's what we did.  It gave us momentum coming in to this one, knowing it was gonna be a dogfight with a good Dallas team in their house, on a stage we played them on and we got it done.

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10 Eli Manning – QB

Is there something about playing in this building that brings out the best in you?  No, we find ways to win. We've had some wild games here over the years, and none probably wilder than this one, coming down to a field goal.  One goes in, we call a time out; the next one gets blocked.  So just a great job by our guys, just fighting, hanging in there; not getting down, not getting frustrated and continuing to believe the whole time that we were going to be able to go down there and score two touchdowns at the end and get the two point conversion and that's what we expected to do and that's what we did.

After Dez Bryant caught the touchdown, what was your mindset at that point?   Well, I just knew – Coach Gilbride was sitting right there.  He said, "Hey, we need two scores.  Go do it."  That's what we needed.  We needed two scores and that was the mindset.  We've been in these situations before.  It's nothing new.  I don't like being in these situations.  It's becoming a habit and a bad habit but we find ways to overcome it.  It's fun way to win but I'd like to have a lead and try to hold onto one for once.

Did this feel like the season was on the line? You know, I think you treat every game the same.  You've got to be careful of start feeling like this season's on the line.    You can start playing tense or start getting worried or getting down. That was never the mindset.  You just say, "Hey, we've gotta go score.  We've gotta go win the game; we've gotta score two touchdowns."  I thought guys played loose and we were just trying to go out there and win a game.

Were you mentally prepared for overtime?  Yeah.  When they were right there about to kick a field goal, I was getting prepared for overtime.  But, before that, I was just rooting for our defense, trying to see if they could make a play, get a sack, you know, make a big play to try to end the game.  Tony (Romo) did a great job driving them down there – made some clutch throws and obviously our defense and JPP (Jason Pierre-Paul) did a great job getting that block on the field goal.

How did you like Coughlin's time out, right before the field goal? That was good.  It worked out very well.  Obviously, everybody knows what happened last week.  They called the time out and they missed the second one.  This one similar, except we blocked it.  Good idea by Coach Coughlin and the guys executed well in getting it blocked.

What was the distraction level, if any, with the Ahmad Bradshaw situation?  No distraction.  We knew what we had to do.  We've got running backs who can play.  Brandon's been running great, so it was no distraction at all.

Question inaudible.  It's a big win, no doubt.  We're excited.   It's been awhile since we had that winning feeling so it's good to have that in the locker room, so a lot of excited guys, a lot of smiles, and obviously it won't mean anything if we don't go finish the season strong and win these next games, so that's the mindset.  We can't relax now.  We can't start feeling great about ourselves now.

Even when Bradshaw plays, how much does this team need Brandon Jackson to run the way he ran today?  Brandon ran hard today.  He made some big plays and that's what you have to do against a good pass rush.

In those last two drives, did you feel any pressure at all?  I don't think I ever feel pressure when I'm playing football.  I think, you know, I know my assignments, I'm trying  to read the defense.  I know my plays and I try to make plays.  I try to get the ball to my receivers' hands, my backs' hands and let them do their jobs.  It's exciting.  It's fun.  I'm competitive and I'm just trying to do whatever I can to get a win.

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