Ravens Gift-Wrap Giants a Win With Undisciplined Performance

For the second time in the last three weeks, the Baltimore Ravens entered the fourth quarter of a game with a double-digit lead and all the momentum, and for the third time this season, they lost a game in which they established a double-digit lead and led for the vast majority of the contest.

This time around, it was a lack of overall discipline but especially in key moments proved to be their ultimate downfall in a game they should’ve won convincingly but lost 24-20 to the New York Giants. The Ravens were plagued by penalties, mistakes, and drops which were compounded by a pair of late turnovers that sealed their defeat and paved a path for the Giants to complete a miraculous rally.

According to Pro Football Reference, the Ravens were flagged a season-high 10 times for a season-high 74 yards, the vast majority of which came on pre-snap and procedural penalties but they also had some bad post-snap and dead-ball penalties as well that included a pair on defense that extended two of New York’s three scoring drives in the second half.

The offense had several promising drives in which they crossed the midfield stall out because of false start penalties that forced them to try to dig themselves out of long down-andd-distance situations and took them out of field goal range. Had it not been for a false start called on fullback Patrick Ricard followed by a one-yard on a rush by J.K. Dobbins on the next play, perhaps kicker Justin Tucker would’ve snuck the first of his three field goal attempts inside the left upright of the goalpost instead of having the ball hit and bounce off of it.

The most pivotal penalty came on the Ravens’ second-to-last drive of the game and opened the door for the Giants’ late comeback. They were clinging on to a narrow three-point lead and had just started what looked like another promising drive that would chew up time off the clock and perhaps even result in a lead-extending score.

Lamar Jackson had just picked up a crucial first down on third-and-1 from the Ravens’ 44-yard line on a quarterback sneak but the two-yard gain was negated by an illegal formation penalty because running back Kenyan Drake lined up in the wrong place.

“We have to be a little more disciplined,” Drake said in a postgame press conference. “That just kind of goes into the whole entire situation with not finishing in the fourth quarter, those little things that put us behind the eight ball when we have momentum in drives. So, we just have to continue to come together as a team and make sure that we hone in on those details as we continue in this long season.”

Disaster struck on the very next play when Jackson corraled a snap that bounced off his arm and threw an ill-advised pass on a broken play that was intercepted and set the Giants up with a short field they would use to score the game-winning score in just five plays thanks to a defensive pass interference that set the ball up at the one-yard line and negated an interception that would’ve turned the tides back in their favor.

“We’ll regroup, we’ll go to work, and we’re going to find ourselves as a football team,” head coach John Harbaugh said in a postgame press conference. “That’s what we have to do right now; find ourselves as a football team. We have an opportunity to be a very good football team. We can be as good as we want to be and decide to be, and we’re going to go to work with everything we’ve got to get that done.

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Defense Isn’t To Blame 

While they shouldn’t be completely absolved for the part they played in the team’s loss to the Giants, the Ravens defense was not the main culprit in the disappointing outcome. That distinction belongs to their offensive counterparts as it has the past three weeks in which they have gone 1-2.

Even though they outgained the New York Giants 406-238 and moved the ball at will at times on offense, they failed to capitalize on two trips inside the opposing 20-yard line and went 1-of-3 in the red zone, scoring one touchdown and settling for a pair of short field goals. The unit accounted for

The defense actually played a good game considering all the disadvantageous positions they were put in. They only gave up an average of 3.8 yards per play, forced a turnover in an eighth straight game to extend the NFL’s longest active streak dating back to last season, and limited the league’s leader in scrimmage yards through five weeks, Saquon Barkley, to just 95 total yards on 25 combined touches.

According to Pro Football Focus, three of the Ravens’ top five highest-graded players were defenders. Third-year inside linebacker Patrick Queen was the team’s second-highest graded player with an overall of 81.9 after he recorded a team-leading seven total tackles and a forced fumble on a strip-sack to thwart a hail mary attempt by Giants’ quarterback Daniel Jones on the final play of the first half.

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Defensive Line Had A Very Strong Game

While none of them broke the top five in PFF’s overall grades for the game, the Ravens’ dominant play in the trenches was the key to bottling up Barkley, allowing Queen to fly around and make plays, and generating consistent pressure in Giants quarterback Daniel Jones. The defensive line unit accounted for three of the team’s four sacks in the game which got kicked off when rookie Travis Jones recorded the first of his career on New York’s first offensive play from scrimmage.

He finished with four tackles, all of which were solos, including one for a loss, and recorded a pair of quarterback hits as well. Third-year pro Justin Madubuike continued his bolster his breakout campaign with another stellar outing in which he also recorded a sack, led the group in total tackles with five including for a loss, and registered a quarterback hit. Veteran Calais Campbell had a strong game as well in which he tallied four total tackles including one for a loss, a pair of quarterback hits, and a sack to bring his career total to 95.5 as he inches closer to the century mark.

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