Giants-Cowboys: What to watch for in Week 1 matchup

Rookie Reese 'super excited' for debut

Arvell Reese doesn’t have expectations for his NFL debut Sunday night. But the Giants rookie linebacker and No. 5 overall pick knows he will feel a range of emotions playing the Cowboys at MetLife Stadium.

“Super excited. Anxious,” Reese told Newsday. “It’s the first one. So I’m super anxious and it’s kind of crazy.”

John Harbaugh didn’t name starters for the season opener but Reese has taken first-team reps since the spring. He and linebacker Tremaine Edmunds have been heralded as the new faces patrolling the middle of the field with their length and athleticism.

Reese has another reason to be eager for Sunday — Caleb Downs, his former Ohio State teammate, is also making his debut for the Cowboys at safety.

After the draft, Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer told NFL Network that Downs was “making mental notes” for the Giants and the Commanders after neither team drafted him before the Cowboys did at No. 11 (the Giants also had the 10th overall pick). 

Reese wasn’t surprised hearing that.

“That’s the type of person he is,” Reese said. “He’s a competitor. He competes at every thing he does whether its on the field or everything off the field.”

Reese, however, is more focused on his job. He and Downs won’t share the field so the goal is greeting him afterward with the scoreboard in Reese’s favor.

“I’m really just looking forward to winning,” he said. “Just doing whatever I can to help the team win. Showing up, making plays whenever that time comes.” 

Edmunds: No reps, no problem

The Giants signed Tremaine Edmunds to be the quarterback of their defense this offseason. The veteran linebacker will make his debut Sunday night, and he will do so without having taken any reps in the preseason.

Edmunds was one of a few projected defensive starters who sat out all three of the exhibition games. Defensive coordinator Dennard Wilson wasn’t at all concerned that Edmunds hasn’t played any game reps for him yet.

“This is his ninth year in the National Football League,” Wilson said. “He's played enough football, enough meaningful games. Him not playing in the preseason isn't going to affect the way he plays come Sunday night."

Edmunds told Newsday he also isn’t worried about the lack of game snaps in his new and crucial role.

“There are things that will come up and it’s still early on for all of us,” he said. “But I’m not looking in the past. Right now we’re worried about getting ready for Week 1 so I am doing everything in my power to put myself in position to make plays, communicate, and do whatever I gotta do moving forward.”


Dart vs. Dak and Dallas

Jaxson Dart got a solid taste of the NFC East rivalry circuit last year. He was 2-2 as a starter against the NFC East, including a win over the Cowboys in the season finale. (

That’s not exactly dominance, especially since the Cowboys pulled most of their starters by halftime, including quarterback Dak Prescott. But rivalries have often gone the right way for the former Ole Miss quarterback.

“We lost one in college against Mississippi State, but I feel like Ole Miss has dominated that rivalry,” Dart said this week. “Dominated all my high school ones. And then, just trying to stack and build on that into the league today.”

Dart will get a chance to go 2-0 against the Cowboys on Sunday night. It’s still a long way from Prescott’s mastery over the Giants, a team he beat 14 consecutive times before last season's finale. Dart, however, is ready to match up against Prescott for a full game this time. It will be Ole Miss vs. Mississippi State.

“I'm excited to go get the chance to play against him," Dart said. "He's a great quarterback, and it's going to be fun to go against him head-to-head.”


'Colton Hood, American Deli'

Colton Hood played at three colleges — Auburn, Colorado and Tennessee — which is not all that unusual for young NFL players these days. It does however present a conundrum when it comes to the long-standing league tradition of filming a Sunday Night Football intro for NBC.

You know those, when the player lifts his head up as if he was just awoken from a nap, looks into the camera and states his name and his alma mater.

Hood recorded his recently and rather than choose any of his three former schools, he told Newsday he decided to go a different, creative route.

“I said “American Deli,’” Hood said. “I said ‘Colton Hood, American Deli’ just to be different.”

It’s a shout-out to his favorite chicken wings shop back home in Georgia.

“Bangin’," he said. “If you are ever in Atlanta, go to American Deli.”

Hood did say if he absolutely had to say the name of a school and not a restaurant he would have said Tennessee. “That’s where I came out of and I think I grew the most there, made the most plays,” he said

There is good chance no one hears it, at least not this week. Only the offensive and defensive starters typically get their intros on air. Hood isn’t expected to be among the opening 11 against the Cowboys on Sunday.

Still, just filming the iconic delivery was a hoot for Hood.

“It’s crazy,” he said. “Seeing it your whole life and then hopefully getting to be on there and your parents and friends film it at home and you get to see that, I think that’s another surreal moment of being in the league.”