Giants looking to repeat the ‘key difference’ that helped them to first win

NEW ORLEANS — Compared with what went down last season and early this season, what the Giants achieved last week in one particular area on defense represented a stark improvement.

They intercepted two of Justin Herbert’s passes in a 21-18 victory over the Chargers.

Without those forced turnovers, it is highly likely the Giants would be 0-4 instead of 1-3 heading into Sunday’s game at New Orleans.

The two picks — the first by nose tackle Dexter Lawrence, the second by cornerback Dru Phillips — both put the offense at the Chargers’ 3-yard line, directly leading to 10 points for the Giants.

“Yeah, absolutely I think that was really a key difference, last week compared to the first couple weeks,’’ cornerback Paulson Adebo said. “Where we had opportunities to maybe make some of those plays, and those types of game-changing plays definitely affect the outcome of the game, so the more we have those turnovers, it’ll help us.’’

Adebo spent the first four years of his NFL career with the Saints, coming away with 10 interceptions in 52 games, with seven of the picks coming in 2023 and 2024.

This will be his first game against the team that selected him in the third round of the 2021 draft.

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Last season, Adebo saw how rookie quarterback Spencer Rattler arrived as a fifth-round pick and ended up starting six games, going 0-6.

This season, Rattler and the Saints are winless, but at least he is not throwing the ball up for grabs at an alarming rate. He has five touchdown passes and only one interception.

“I think going into his second year, he looks a little bit more comfortable,’’ Adebo said. “So, they’re doing some good things with him, and I also got to see him every day in practice, so very familiar.’’

The Giants have three interceptions this season, putting them tied with eight other teams for the eighth-most in the league. Last season, the Giants finished with five interceptions — only the Browns, with four, had fewer. The Giants also went an NFL-record 11 consecutive games without an interception.

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Jaxson Dart in his first NFL start passed for one touchdown and ran for another. If he does that again in his second NFL start, he would become the sixth quarterback since 1950 to record both a touchdown pass and touchdown run in his first two starts.

It is quite an eclectic list: Eric Hipple (1981), Jake Delhomme (1999), Tim Tebow (2010), Cam Newton (2011) and Sam Howell (2022-23).

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Brian Burns leads the Giants with five sacks, tying him with Byron Young of the Rams for the league lead. It is the most sacks by a Giants player in the first four games of a season since Osi Umenyiora had six in the first four games in 2007. The most sacks in franchise history in the first four games of a season is eight, by Lawrence Taylor in 1984.