Arizona running back Beanie Wells rushed for over 130 yards and scored 3 rushing Touchdowns to cap an unbelievable performance against the highly recognized New York defense. However, it was the heroics of Eli Manning that ended up stealing the show with only 31 seconds to play in the 4th quarter.
New York did not come out firing on all cylinders to start the game. Whether it was a lack of focus or the long distance between New York and Arizona is anyone’s guess. In the 2nd quarter, the Arizona Cardinals went up by a score of 6-0 on two Jay Feely field goals in the 1st and 2nd quarter. The Giants finally began showing life with a 10 play and 69 yard offensive drive that was capped by an Ahmad Bradshaw 13 yard touchdown run that gave the Giants a 7-6 lead. When the Cardinals could not put a decent drive together after the Giants rushing touchdown, Manning lead the Giants down to the Cardinals 30 yard line which allow the kicker Lawrence Tynes to kick the go ahead field goal which made it 10-6 Giants going into the half.
The highly touted trade this off-season of Kevin Kolb from the Philadelphia Eagles to the Arizona Cardinals has yet to show high dividends for the NFC West Cardinals. To start the second half the Cardinals were able to strike first with a Wells 1 yard touchdown to go up 13-10 on the New York Giants. The Giants defense overall was hit or miss throughout the entirety of the game. Although the disgruntled defensive end for the Giants Osi Umenyiora did have 2 sacks and a forced fumble for the game, it was not a great collective efforts by the New York defense. The only other two defensive stand outs for the Giants were defense end Dave Tollefson who, like Umenyiora, collected 2 sacks and free safety Antrel Rolle was able to capitalize on a mistake by the new Cardinals quarterback Kolb. The Arizona defense was also able to force turnovers in that defensive tackle David Carter sacked Eli Manning to force a fumble in the 3rd quarter.
The 3rd quarter did not end until Wells was able to rush in for another touchdown just before the start of the 4th quarter in order to go up 20-10 on the Giants. The 4th quarter would prove to be the difference maker in this game even though the Cardinals were beginning to look like the better team.
Literally all of the 4th quarter scoring took place with less than 6 minutes to play and at first, the scores were going back and forth. Brandon Jacobs, Giants running back rushed one in to put the Giants within a field goal to tie. Then Wells came right back and answered with another rushing touchdown. It was then that two scores by the Giants, both passing touchdowns by Eli Mannings put the Giants up for good with a 31-27 win in the Arizona desert.
