Giants vs. Cowboys: Preview, prediction, what to watch for in Week 18

An inside look at Sunday’s Giants-Cowboys NFL Week 18 matchup at MetLife Stadum:

Marquee matchup

Cowboys passing attack vs. Giants pass defense 

This a marquee mismatch.

The Cowboys have the NFL’s No. 1 passing offense and are fourth in the league in scoring.

The Giants have the No. 20 passing defense and 26th scoring defense.

Dak Prescott leads the league with 4,482 passing yards and has two top-flight targets in George Pickens (92-1,420) and CeeDee Lamb (74-1,073).

The Giants have Paulson Adebo and Deonte Banks (gulp) as their starting corners, with Cor’Dale Flott out with a knee injury. 

Four downs

Long time ago: Back in Week 2, Jaxson Dart was a backup quarterback and received the first three snaps in his NFL career. Mostly, he watched starter Russell Wilson throw for 450 yards and three touchdowns in a 40-37 overtime loss at Dallas. 

“Forever, definitely seems like forever,” Dart said of how long ago that game felt to him. He is now in charge of the offense for the rematch with the Cowboys as his rookie season comes to an end. “I would love to continue to keep playing,” he said. “I love football. There’s no thought for me of hoping for this to be over. I want to keep going. It’s going to kill me to watch other teams play while we’re not.” 

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No defense for this: The reason the Cowboys are packing up and heading home after this game is their putrid defense.

They have allowed a touchdown or field goal attempt on 75 percent of their defensive drives in their past four games. The records of their opponents in those four games is 31-32. The Giants way back in Week 2 saw there was no ‘D’ in Dallas, amassing 506 total yards and seeing Wilson shred a porous secondary. The Cowboys give up 29.8 points a game — dead last in the league. 

Midstream adjustments: Is it fair to judge an interim head coach who takes over midway or late in a season? He can only make so many changes. He can make tweaks but cannot revamp the entire offense or defense.

Mike Kafka took over 10 games into the season, and he is 1-5 with one game to go.

If he had a full training camp, he clearly would have made a much deeper imprint on the team. 

“As I thought about this role in general, you certainly have a plan, you certainly have thoughts on how you would handle certain situations, how you would handle certain players, how you would handle certain things throughout the week and I’ve tried to implement those things,” Kafka said. “Again, the whole basis and the genesis of everything when I first got it was let’s not just make change to make change just because. Let’s do it with intent.” 

Sheer dominance: Who owns the New York Giants?

The Mara and Tisch families are the co-owners, as far as the business side of things but Dak Prescott owns them on the field. Prescott as a rookie in 2016 went 0-2 against the Giants and 13-1 against the rest of the league. Since then, Prescott is 14-0 against the team he loves to beat. That is the second-longest winning streak for a quarterback against a single opponent. Bob Griese of the Dolphins won 17 straight against the Bills from 1968-79.

Paul’s pick

Figuring out motivation in Week 18 is always tricky with teams already eliminated from the playoffs.

The Cowboys can score on anyone and usually do, and they have beaten the Giants nine consecutive times. Making it 10 at half-filled MetLife Stadium with plenty of Dallas fans in the seats should not be a tall order. 

Cowboys 27, Giants 13