FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — New England’s pass routes may be a little quicker this week.
The Patriots receivers know the best way they can help Tom Brady this week is by getting open in a hurry because the quarterback may not have a lot of time to find them.
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The Patriots (5-2) are at home Sunday against the New York Giants, who lead the NFL in sacks with 26.
“They’re one of the best pass rushes around,” New England receiver Wes Welker said. “Getting open with quickness and making sure that we try and tire those guys out as much as possible is going to help us.”
New England allowed three sacks last week in a loss at Pittsburgh. While the Steelers have one of the top overall defenses in the NFL, nobody gets to the quarterback like the Giants (5-2).
Jason Pierre-Paul is fifth in the league with 8.5 and Osi Umenyiora is also in the Top 10 with six — after missing the first three games with a knee injury.
“They do everything. They mix in the pressures,” offensive lineman Brian Waters said Friday. “They’re a good enough group to get it done on their own. They’re a good enough group to just rush the four guys. And they’ve got a number of sacks on rushing three.”
The Giants needed to rally from a 14-3 deficit last week to beat winless Miami 20-17. But New York did hold Miami to just 246 yards of offense and only 101 yards came off passes.
New York’s only glitch has been stopping the run. The Giants rank 28th in rushing defense and are 21st when it comes to points allowed.
But the Patriots hardly consider the Giants to be vulnerable.
“Hopefully we can move the ball and score points. That’s what we always try to do on offense. I don’t know. You tell me what they’re going to be in. They come and line up 10 guys on the line of scrimmage, I don’t think we want to run the ball,” New England coach Bill Belichick said. “What we do will in part depend on what they do.”
While the Patriots would love to get some deep passes back into their offense, this may not be the week to do it.
Brady, who was held to 198 yards passing last week at Pittsburgh, said the Patriots will need to move the ball however they can against the Giants
“If they don’t give you the opportunity then you got to be more methodical with your drives and sometimes that’s very good for an offense as well,” Brady said. “We have to do whatever they’re not covering. Whatever they’re covering we got to do something different.”
The Giants haven’t played New England during the regular season since the Patriots’ 38-35 win at New York in December 2007. The Giants won the rematch, however, two months later in the Super Bowl.
Losing streaks have been rare lately in New England, which hasn’t lost back-to-back games since 2009.
“We’re 5-2 coming off a loss. It feels like we’re 0-7. That’s not a good feeling for us,” receiver Deion Branch said. “We want to get out there and shake this off as soon as possible.”
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