The Giants on Monday finally fired defensive coordinator Shane Bowen.
And so ends a disastrous season-plus tenure during which Bowen’s group failed to replicate what Wink Martindale accomplished from 2022-23 in East Rutherford.
The Giants, losers of six straight, are 2-10 and have already fired coach Brian Daboll. So Bowen was going to be a goner after the season anyway.
Interim head coach Mike Kafka (0-2 on the job) simply decided to make the decision now, after yet another fourth-quarter collapse during Sunday’s loss at Detroit.
Outside linebackers coach Charlie Bullen will take over as interim defensive coordinator, for what it’s worth (not a whole lot).
Daboll’s ugly divorce from Martindale after 2023 set the stage for the big whistle having to settle for Bowen (who wasn’t his first choice) leading into last season. And the hire completely failed.
Bottom line: Even before Sunday’s 34-27 overtime loss in Detroit, the Giants surely were going to have a new head coach and new defensive coordinator in 2026.
So Bowen’s firing Monday is pretty much just cosmetic, with five games remaining in yet another lost season.
In half of the Giants’ 10 losses this season, they led in the fourth quarter.
They blew fourth-quarter leads in Dallas, Denver, Chicago and now Detroit. They also did it at home against Green Bay.
Which means they’ve now done it in three straight games — against the Lions, Packers and Bears — and four times in their current six-game losing streak, if you throw in the Broncos debacle.
The Lions game was the last straw for Kafka, as he decided enough was enough and Bowen had to go.
The Giants led 27-17 until 10:50 remained in the game. They were up 27-24 until the Lions got a 59-yard field goal with 28 seconds left, sending the game to overtime and capping a 53-yard drive.
And on the first play of overtime, Jahmyr Gibbs ran 69 yards for a touchdown. That was the final play of Bowen’s Giants tenure. And it was fitting, considering his defense could never stop the run.
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