Tom Coughlin: Giants defense was ‘soft’ against Steelers

The New York Giants lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers last weekend for a number of reasons, one of them being their poor play defensively. One of the reasons the Steelers were able to overcome a number of poor calls from the officials was that they moved the ball and established a solid running game. On Monday, Tom Coughlin called his defense out for the lackluster performance.

“It was soft, no question,” Coughlin said according to The Star-Ledger. “It was soft early. We came back and played a little bit better and then they had their breakout there at the end of the game.”

Even Justin Tuck agreed that the Giants’ defensive front seven was “mushed” around by the Steelers offensive lineman. Considering the fact that Isaac Redman ran for 147 yards on 26 carries, that seems fairly obvious.

“Not to the point where they were more physical than us,” Tuck asserted. “But to the point where you got a guy in the gap and Redman was just behind his guard, behind his guard, and a guy jumps out of his gap trying to get around to get to Redman and he kind of like filters forward for three more, four more yards, and that’s just us got to do a better job of escaping blocks and getting to the ball carrier.”

Redman gained 74 yards after contact, so the Giants clearly did a poor job of tackling. That is likely wear Coughlin’s assertion that his defense was soft comes in. New York should have an easier time against the Bengals and BenJarvus Green-Ellis on Sunday. If not, they could turn the NFC East into a much tighter race than it needs to be.