2011 New York Giants season

2011 New York Giants season
Owner	John Mara Steve Tisch
General manager	Jerry Reese
Head coach	Tom Coughlin
Offensive coordinator	Kevin Gilbride
Defensive coordinator	Perry Fewell
Home field	MetLife Stadium
Results
Record	9–7
Division place	1st NFC East
Playoff finish	Won Wild Card Playoffs (vs. Falcons) 24–2 Won Divisional Playoffs (at Packers) 37–20 Won NFC Championship (at 49ers) 20–17 (OT) Won Super Bowl XLVI (vs. Patriots) 21–17
Pro Bowlers	Selected but did not participate due to participation in Super Bowl XLVI: QB Eli Manning DE Jason Pierre-Paul
AP All-Pros	DE Jason Pierre-Paul (1st team) WR Victor Cruz (2nd team)
Uniform
← 2010 Giants seasons 2012 →

The 2011 New York Giants season was the 87th season for the team in the National Football League (NFL). They played all of their home games at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Although the team failed to improve on their 10–6 mark from 2010, the Giants were able to qualify for the playoffs, and in another Cinderella run that paralleled what they did in 2007, they won Super Bowl XLVI, their fourth Super Bowl win in franchise history.

Many analysts predicted a rough year for the Giants.^[1] Despite highs and lows throughout the season, the Giants, with a 9–7 record, returned to the NFL playoffs for the first time since 2008, winning the NFC East and finished the season as the NFC's #4 seed. New York finished 10–6 in 2010 but failed to qualify for the playoffs due to not having any tiebreakers over any NFC playoff team. The Giants entered their week 17 match up with the Cowboys with both teams tied for the division lead with 8–7 records. The Giants took a 21–0 first half lead and while the Cowboys closed the gap to make the score 21–14 early in the 4th quarter, the Giants held on to defeat the Cowboys 31–14, clinching the divisional title and a playoff berth.

In the playoffs, the Giants defeated the Atlanta Falcons, Green Bay Packers, and the San Francisco 49ers to win the NFC championship. The Giants defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI, which was a rematch of Super Bowl XLII from 4 years earlier in which the Giants defeated the previously undefeated Patriots. As in 2007, 1990, and 1986, the Giants played their eventual Super Bowl opponent during the regular season. The Giants also played the Packers and 49ers during the season, losing both games in the final minutes of play.

The 2011 Giants were the first team in NFL history to reach the Super Bowl with a negative regular season point differential (minus-6, 394 points scored, 400 points allowed). With a 9–7 record, the Giants became the third NFL team to win fewer than 10 games in a 16-game season, and reach the Super Bowl.^[2] but became the first of the three to win the Super Bowl. The previous teams to go 9–7 and reach the Super Bowl (the 1979 Rams, who only needed two playoff wins were the first, and the 2008 Arizona Cardinals) were both defeated by the Pittsburgh Steelers. Additionally, upon defeating the Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI the Giants became the first NFC East Division champion to win the Super Bowl since the Dallas Cowboys in 1995 (the Giants were a Wild Card team when they won Super Bowl XLII).

The 2011 Giants were an aberration from other great Giants teams of the past who were built around tough, physical defensive play and an offense built around a power running attack. Despite Jason Pierre-Paul having a breakout Pro Bowl season with 16.5 sacks, the defense was ranked in the bottom 10 in points and yards allowed and was top 10 in penalties. Their normally durable rushing attack of Brandon Jacobs and Ahmad Bradshaw was ranked last in the NFL with 89 rushing yards per game as a team. The standout of the year was the quarterback play of Eli Manning who threw a career-high and franchise record 4,933 passing yards with 29 touchdown passes. Manning, who was criticized for throwing 25 interceptions in 2010 and considering himself an "elite quarterback"^{[citation needed]} in a class that included his brother and Tom Brady, engineered 6 regular season game-winning drives in 2011 and threw 15 touchdown passes in the 4th quarter, NFL records that still stand. He improved upon his interception total, lowering it to 16. He had 2 more game-winning drives in the playoffs, the NFC Championship and Super Bowl XLVI. Manning's 5 career game-winning drives in the playoffs are tied for third in NFL history with Joe Montana and became the fifth player to win multiple Super Bowl MVP awards. Manning's play subsequently led to the breakout of undrafted wide receiver Victor Cruz and the emergence of Cruz and Hakeem Nicks as the best wide receiver duo in the NFL. Cruz set a franchise record 1,536 receiving yards from 82 receptions, while Nicks had 76 receptions for 1,192 yards.

Some news organizations, among them The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, said that the Giants' victory in the Super Bowl made them the NFL's version of the 2011 World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals, saying that these two championship teams had been given the last rites by many near the end of the season, but emerged as champions at the end.^[3] The 2012 Stanley Cup champion Los Angeles Kings also followed a similar path to the Cardinals and Giants a few months later, qualifying for the final playoff spot in the Western Conference in their penultimate regular season game^[4] only to dominate in the playoffs, just losing a record-tying low of four playoff games, en route to the franchise's first championship.

This season was the last time the Giants qualified for the playoffs under Coughlin, and would not reach the playoffs again until the 2016 season and would not win a playoff game until the 2022 season. To date, 2011 is the last time the Giants have won the NFC East.