The New Orleans Saints beat the New York Giants on Sunday, 52-49. It was a high-scoring game and a very productive day for both Drew Brees and Eli Manning. As such, it was a particularly poor day for both secondaries, which allowed a total of 13 touchdowns between the two quarterbacks. That's an NFL record.
Giants vs. Saints was a historic maelstrom of passing brilliance and awful defense
Brees and Manning combined for 13 touchdowns in a crazy 52-49 win for the Saints.
At the end of the game, the Saints relied on the only field goal of the game to win it, as Kai Forbath pushed one in from 51 yards out as time expired to give New Orleans the win. Drew Brees finished with 40 of 50 completions for 511 yards and seven touchdowns with an interception. Eli Manning completed 30 of 41 passes for 350 yards and six touchdowns.
It was about as good a gunslinger duel as you could expect. Odell Beckham Jr. had a huge game for the Giants, with eight catches for 130 yards and three touchdowns, while both Benjamin Watson and Marques Colston had over 100 yards and a touchdown apiece for the Saints.
The Saints finished with 103 rushing yards to New York’s 87. It was hardly the focus of the game.
Neither the Giants nor the Saints were able to field a strong defense in the game. After two quarters of play, Manning had completed 18 of 21 passes for 165 yards and three touchdowns, while Brees completed 19 of 21 passes for 300 yards and four touchdowns. Few balls ever touched the ground -- save for the Manning fumble where he sort of forgot how to hold the football -- and it was a relatively high-scoring affair.
The Giants got on the board first when Manning hit Odell Beckham Jr. for a 2-yard touchdown, but the Saints quickly responded when Brees hit Willie Snead for a 34-yard touchdown in the same quarter. You can see the play below:
Brees struck again, from 26 yards out, to Brandin Cooks before they hit the second quarter.
Both teams managed a pair of touchdowns in the second quarter, with Brees hitting Snead and Marques Colston, the latter of which went for 53 yards. Manning led the Giants on a 10-play, 80-yard drive capped off with a Shane Vereen touchdown with just two seconds left on the clock in the first half to make it 28-21 in favor of the Saints heading into the second half.
It didn’t take long for Manning to match Brees and tie up the game, however. Manning found Beckham for his third touchdown of the game, this one from 50 yards out. The running game was essentially forgotten at this point, as Brees hit Cooks again to go up 35-28. New Orleans was able to pile on their lead from there, when the Giants failed to take advantage of a Brees interception and when he got the ball back, he threw yet another touchdown pass.
At one point, the Saints got a sack fumble on the Giants and had an opportunity to pile on even more, but a penalty called the play back and the Giants maintained possession in the fourth quarter. Faced with a fourth down situation, Manning managed to hit Dwayne Harris for a 9-yard touchdown to pull within a score with 12 minutes left.
And then he did the same exact thing to tie the game on the next possession.
But if you thought this was going to continue to an ending where both teams throw a few more touchdowns just for fun, you're ... kind of right. Brees threw another touchdown on the day ... to the other team. Well, it was officially ruled a fumble as the ball popped loose, and there was nothing Brees could do about it. Trumaine McBride caught the loose ball and took it 63 yards for a touchdown to give New York their first lead since they scored the first touchdown of the game.
The lead lasted until the final minutes of the game, before Brees threw his seventh touchdown pass of the day, this one to C.J. Spiller. A converted extra point and the game was tied yet again with 36 seconds left on the clock. A bad facemask penalty by the Giants' punting unit gave the Saints the ball with just a couple seconds left on the clock, and Forbath was able to kick the game-winning field goal from the spot.
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