‘We left it all on the field’

The New York Giants fell to the Washington Commanders, 21-6, on Sunday in a deflating start to the 2025 regular season.

After a summer filled with optimism, Big Blue fell flat in the Nation’s Capital, getting outplayed, outcoached, and outhustled by the superior Commanders.

Quarterback Russell Wilson, who was making his 200th NFL start and first as a Giant, had an erratic debut behind a shaky offensive line that appeared to miss starting left tackle Andrew Thomas (foot) more than they’d like to admit.

Wilson completed just 17 of 37 passes for 168 yards with no touchdowns and no interceptions for a 59.3 QB rating. He ran eight times for 44 yards and was under pressure most of the afternoon, absorbing eight QB hits, including two sacks.

Still, the bottom line is the Giants only scored six points. Not enough to beat a top contender such as Washington on the road. They ran 13 plays in the red zone and only came away with three points.

“I’d say with everybody offensively, that’s all of us included, we all got to be better,” head coach Brian Daboll said after the game. “Every coach, every player. You have six points there, just not good enough. We have to do better there.”Wilson felt the Giants’ effort was sufficient in the game, and it was simply execution issues that cost them the game.

“I thought we competed our butts off today,” Wilson said after the game. “That was a physical game. I thought we left it all on the field. We gave it our all physically. You stand tall in the midst of that game. Battling through it, and trying to find a way to win.

“Like I said, they stopped us in the red zone. I think that was the name of this game. We had, I think, eight or nine possessions; two of them were down in the red zone. We didn’t capitalize on those, so that’s what we got to do.”

The loss isn’t about to derail Wilson, who felt as poorly as the Giants’ offense played, was very much in the game for most of the afternoon. He is moving forward to next week’s game in Dallas and is already thinking about corrections.

“Just focus on what we can do better,” he said. “We have a good team, [Washington] is a good football team too. It was a close game; it was 14-6 the whole game. They scored in the last few minutes there. But it was 14-6, we really should have been at least 14-10 or trying to get 14-17 or something like that. Like I said, if you don’t convert in the red zone, that’s what happens.”

Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda.