Eli Manning spent most of Sunday's game running for his life.
The Ravens pass rush had the Giants quarterback under duress throughout the game, keeping him and the offense from getting into a rhythm during the 33-14 victory.
"They put a lot of pressure on me, and they gave us a lot of different looks. They made it hard for us," Manning said. "We couldn't get anything going."
The Ravens sacked Manning three times and hit him nine other times. Coming into Sunday's game, the Giants had allowed just 16 sacks on the season, the fewest in the NFL.
But the Ravens pass rush was able to get to Manning repeatedly, and he had one of his worst games of the year. He finished 14-of-28 for 150 yards, his second-lowest passing total of the season.
"That's what we wanted to do; pressure him and not let him get hot," said defensive tackle Haloti Ngata, who had one of the Ravens' sacks.
The Giants offense struggled overall, finishing with just 186 total yards on the day.
"Anytime you hit a quarterback [and] make him pick himself up off the ground repetitively, they start to second guess themselves and I think we did a great job blitzing him and winning their one-on-one battles," said defensive lineman Art Jones, who had two quarterback hits.
The Ravens used a variety of looks to get pressure on Manning.
Defensive Coordinator Dean Pees dialed up a number of blitz packages, mixing in blitzes from linebackers, cornerbacks and safeties, which seemed confuse the Giants at times.
"We had a few really good pressure schemes that happened to hit the protection the right way," Head Coach John Harbaugh said. "That was a plus for Dean and our coaches. They did a nice job of scheming it up."
"Dean Pees did a great job of calling pressures at the right time," Ngata added.
Linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo and rookie safety Omar Brown also notched one sack apiece, which both came on blitzes. The sack for Brown was the first defensive tackle of his career.
"Omar was out there making plays," Ngata said. "It's great that those guys can step up, understand what their role is and make some plays for us."
The performance by the defense came on a day where the unit was playing without some key pieces. Starting safety Bernard Pollard and linebackers Albert McClellan and Ray Lewis were out, but the group responded with one of its best showings of the year.
"It's huge for us," Ngata said. "I think it's a step forward."
In addition to the pressure up front on* *Manning, the Ravens also played well in the defensive secondary to keep the wide receivers from getting open. Nobody had more than 43 receiving yards for the Giants, and the Ravens had 11 passes defensed on the day.
"We made things tough on Eli today," cornerback Cary Williams said. "We did everything we were supposed to do, and we came out on top.
"As a secondary, that's the best we've played all year. The front seven did a good job of putting Eli under pressure, so it was good. Actually, I have to say yes, it was the best effort we've had all year."
