3 Takeaways from Giants' Week 9 Win

In recent weeks, the New York Giants have been playing much better football. And that continued Sunday afternoon, when they picked up one of their biggest wins of the 2021 season.

The Giants held on for a 23-16 victory over the Las Vegas Raiders at MetLife Stadium, as a pair of fourth-quarter field goals from Graham Gano sealed the win. It was New York's second victory in three weeks after it began the season 1-5.

Facing a three-point halftime deficit, the Giants quickly took the lead in the second half, as Xavier McKinney's 41-yard interception return touchdown put them ahead 17-13. They led the rest of the way, with Las Vegas being held to three points in the second half.

Here are three takeaways from New York's Week 9 win.

The Giants defense gave up 403 total yards Sunday, so it was far from a perfect performance. But the unit delivered some big plays at opportune times, two of them courtesy of McKinney, who is showing why New York took him in the second round of the 2020 NFL draft.

McKinney notched a pair of interceptions, both of which came at times when the Giants needed it. His first was a pick-six that marked the first touchdown of his NFL career and gave New York the lead. Then he intercepted Las Vegas quarterback Derek Carr again with five minutes, 12 seconds to go in the fourth quarter. Six plays later, Gano booted a 38-yard field goal that pushed the Giants' lead to seven.

McKinney has four interceptions in his sophomore season, and the first two also came in the same game (a Week 6 loss to the Los Angeles Rams). And it shouldn't be a surprise that it only took until his fourth career interception in his 15th NFL game to get into the end zone given his approach on turnovers.

"My mentality every time I get the ball is to get yards and try to make a play, make a touchdown for our team," McKinney said, per The Athletic's Dan Duggan.

With McKinney roaming the secondary, the Giants may have more big-time plays coming on defense.

Although the Giants offense is getting healthier, it is still without some key players. That includes running back Saquon Barkley, who missed his fourth straight game because of an ankle injury. So Devontae Booker got another opportunity to be New York's top option out of the backfield.

Booker hadn't amassed more than 60 rushing yards in any of the previous three games, but he was much more effective on the ground against Las Vegas. The 29-year-old had 99 yards on 21 carries and also notched three receptions for 23 yards.

The Giants had only 245 total yards, so Booker's production was invaluable. And he could have put up even bigger numbers, but a hip injury caused him to miss the final five minutes as New York was closing out its victory.

"I had an X-ray, and everything was good," Booker said after the game, per Ryan Dunleavy of the New York Post. "I feel great right now. Just enjoying this moment."

That's encouraging considering the Giants can't afford to keep losing more players to injury, especially somebody who's been as valuable as Booker has during Barkley's absence.

Not only have the Giants picked up two wins over the past three weeks, but in their lone loss during that stretch, they nearly pulled off a big upset. In Week 8, they fell 20-17 on the road against the Kansas City Chiefs. New York led in the fourth quarter of that game but couldn't see it out.

Now, the Giants are 3-6 heading into their bye week. It will give them some time to figure out how they can keep their recent momentum going given they will be met with some challenging matchups upon their return to the gridiron.

New York will travel to take on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 11. It's the first of five road games in a seven-week span for the Giants, who have shown they are capable of notching big wins. They just need to keep finding ways to do that down the stretch.

"We have a very resilient team. We have a very mentally tough team," New York head coach Joe Judge said, per Michael Eisen of the team's official site. "To me, the most complementary word you can use for any group of people is 'team,' and they stick together and they work together. They challenge each other, they come back, they respond."

And if the Giants can keep playing as well as they have of late, they could end up a fairly successful team by season's end.