Jones and Slayton emerge in the passing game

The offense entered Sunday’s game without their best playmaker in wide receiver Malik Nabers. The rookie wideout had the highest target share in the NFL after the first four games of the season, while also being among the league leaders in virtually every receiving category. Despite the 21-year-old’s absence due to a concussion suffered in Week 4, the Giants’ passing game didn’t miss a beat.

Quarterback Daniel Jones got off to another strong start, completing 12 of his first 13 passes for 123 yards and a touchdown. He finished the game 23 of 34 (67.6 percent) for 257 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions, giving him a passer rating of 109.6. He also added 38 yards on 11 rushing attempts while forcing six missed tackles, according to Pro Football Focus. One of the key parts of Jones’ success against the Seahawks was the deep ball. Jones connected on both of his deep passes (20+ air yards) for 71 yards and a touchdown. This was the first time he made multiple deep passes in a game since Week 2 of last season. Jones now has three games this season with multiple touchdown passes, no interceptions and a passer rating above 100.

“It’s always been fun coaching him because he’s a true professional,” Daboll said of Jones. “Again, always want the results, but have a lot of confidence in him, how he plays, how he prepares. You know, feel comfortable putting the ball in his hands. That’s what we did early in the game We went after them and threw the ball a little bit. So I have a lot of confidence in him.”

“You know, we’ve said since training camp how much we love our skill guys and how deep we think those positions are,” Jones added. “You saw a lot of guys step up today and play a lot. When we say we mean it. We have a lot of confidence in those guys. You know, they stepped up and played really well.”

With Nabers out, the veteran wide receiver took a big step forward. With an increased goal share, Darius Slayton played his best game of the season. The sixth-year wideout was targeted a game-high 11 times, catching eight of those passes for 122 yards and a touchdown. In fact, Slayton was on the receiving end of both of Jones’ deep completions, as the two passes came within a few plays of each other and resulted in the Giants’ touchdown early in the third quarter. His 122 receiving yards were the third-highest total of his career and the most he has had since the 2020 season. It was also his sixth 100-yard receiving game of his career.

“You have to have a short memory,” Slayton said of the team’s rocky start. “Obviously we came out on the first drive, we drive out there, fumble and give up a touchdown. It went from about as good as you can start to as bad as it can go. That’s exactly who we’re trying to get to .” Become a team. Our identity is to be resilient and able to overcome.”

The Giants faced a tough task against the Seahawks offense. In their Week 4 road loss to the Detroit Lions, the Seahawks gained a whopping 516 yards, 38 first downs, and had a 50 percent conversion rate on third and fourth downs while their running backs averaged nearly 7.0 yards per carry . Well, that all changed against the Giants defense in Week 5.

Seattle finished the day with 333 total yards of offense while totaling 17 first downs. The Giants defense was able to hold the Seahawks to just three conversions on eleven third down attempts, while stopping them on both of their fourth down attempts. The defense was also able to force the Seahawks to completely abandon the run game, as Kenneth Walker and Zach Charbonnet combined for just seven carries and 30 yards, though they did contribute in the passing game. The Seahawks went into halftime with just two rushing yards on two carries, the fewest rushing yards by a Giants opponent in the first half since 2005.

Perhaps the most impressive part of the Seattle defense’s performance was the pass rush. The Giants exploded for seven sacks of Geno Smith, three of which came from defensive lineman Dexter Lawrence. Fellow defensive lineman DJ Davidson recorded the first two full sacks of his NFL career, outside linebacker Brian Burns added one sack and Kayvon Thibodeaux and Rakeem Nunez-Roches shared the seventh sack. The seven-sack performance puts the Giants at 22 sacks in the league this season, two more than any other team. Their 22 sacks are the second-most through five games in Giants history (1985).

Lawrence’s three-sack game puts him at six sacks this season. This puts him tied for the second-most sacks in the NFL and just half a sack behind Detroit’s Aidan Hutchinson for the most sacks in the NFL. According to Next Gen Stats, Lawrence finished with three sacks and five quarterback pressures despite facing a double team on 22 of his rushes (55 percent). The trio of Lawrence, Burns and Thibodeaux each contributed at least half a sack in the same game for the second time this season (Week 3 in Cleveland) and combined for a record 18 quarterback pressures, according to NGS.

“I think we executed the plan well and the defensive line provided good coverage,” Lawrence said after the win. “They gave us time to get there. Geno was looking for a second and third read and that gave us time.”

Lawrence added: “I think we stood up when we had to and made plays when we had to. That’s winning football.”

Cornerback Deonte Banks also deserves a lot of credit for his standout performance against DK Metcalf. Banks lined up opposite Metcalf on 35 of the receiver’s 47 routes and limited him to just two catches on four targets for 24 yards. The second-year corner also had a big play when he knocked the ball out of Metcalf’s hands, which Tyler Nubin recovered just outside the red zone to stop Seattle’s first drive of the second half. Banks finished the game with six tackles (two solo) and a career-high three passes defended, while Pro Football Focus graded him for a 49.6 passer rating when targeted.