Giants’ Tom Coughlin says he was wrong on Victor Cruz fumble

After the New York Giants loss to the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday, head coach Tom Coughlin was upset that the referees didn’t blow the whistle on the play when Victor Cruz fumbled. The fumble was returned for a touchdown and Couglin argued that the play should have been blown dead because of forward progress.

“We started the year off knowing full well that the officials were going to blow the whistle this season on every play. You hope that the whistle should blow,” Coughlin said, via the New York Daily News. “For them to have a touchdown on a play like that is just unbelievable.”

Now Coughlin is backing off those claims.

“From what I understand there has been some misunderstanding from what I felt,” Coughlin said, via the Star-Ledger. “When I looked at the tape today, the forward progress was not stopped. That wasn’t even an issue when you looked at the tape and that’s exactly what the official told me. We all would’ve liked for the whistle to blow in that case but it didn’t and Victor was still driving as hard as he could to get more yardage. There were three or four Dallas defenders that were flying to the ball there. In one desperate effort [by Cruz] to get further up the field, the ball gets ripped out right into [Cowboys safety Jeff Heath’s] hand and he takes it and runs into the end zone. No. There was nothing to discuss there after watching the tape.”