Eagles top Giants despite mistakes
PHILADELPHIA — Sam Bradford kept the New York Giants in the game. His defense wouldn’t let Eli Manning do anything.
DeMarco Murray ran for 109 yards and a touchdown, Nolan Carroll returned one of Manning’s two interceptions for a score and the Philadelphia Eagles beat the Giants 27-7 Monday night.
The Eagles had three takeaways, sacked Manning three times and forced two intentional grounding penalties.
“All the credit goes to them,” Bradford said of Philadelphia’s defense. “For us to go where we want to go, I’ve got to play much better.”
No kidding.
Bradford threw for 280 yards with a 32-yard TD pass to Riley Cooper, but had three interceptions. The Giants got zero points off the turnovers.
“We were stagnant,” Giants coach Tom Coughlin said. “They did more with their opportunities than we did.”
The Eagles (3-3) have won two straight to move from last place in the NFC East into a tie for first with the Giants (3-3). The teams meet again in Week 17.
Neither team looked sharp in front of a prime-time audience. They combined for seven turnovers and 21 penalties.
“That’s bad football,” Coughlin said.
The Giants gave the Eagles first downs on a roughing-the-passer penalty and a running-into-the-kicker penalty to keep both of their TD drives going.
Wearing all-black uniforms for the third time in franchise history, the Eagles got off to another slow start.
Manning completed his first 10 passes, including a 13-yard TD pass to Odell Beckham Jr. for a 7-0 lead.
But things went downhill for Manning from there.
The Eagles took a 14-7 lead in the second quarter when Carroll jumped in front of a pass intended for Dwayne Harris and ran it back untouched for his first career TD.
“Terrible read by me, bad decision to make that throw,” Manning said.
After Nikita Whitlock ran into punter Donnie Jones to give Philadelphia a first down at its 28, Murray took over. He had two runs of 11 yards each and finished off the drive with a 12-yard TD run to give Philadelphia a 24-7 lead.
