Tom Coughlin: 'Not the kind of game we planned to play'

New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin called Sunday's 24-20 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers "as disappointing a loss as we've had around here in a long time" during his post-game press conference.

"Not to be overly reactionary or emotional, but to play a very good football team like that, and to have two illegal procedure penalties take us out of field goal range in the first half and have a third down where we are offside creating a 4th-and-3 where they have to kick a field goal, and covering kicks and punts the way we did was terrible, was awful. Offensively, again, for a couple games in a row we didn't play well. We didn't appear to be very aggressive," Coughlin said.

"We wanted emotionally so badly to win the game for obvious reasons, for all our neighbors who are struggling and who need some type of inspiration. Of course, we didn't provide it for them. We didn't play well and we are going to have to get this straightened around, some way, some form here, quickly obviously. That was not the kind of game we had planned to play."

The Giants are now 1-8 in Week 9 during Coughlin's tenure as head coach. Coughlin was, of course, asked about the possibility of another second-half of the season collapse by the Giants, something they have experienced a few times during Coughlin's eight previous seasons. The coach, of course, brushed that off.

"I am not a counter of where our record was then and when we had some struggles. I'm just looking at our team right now and what we can do to snap out of this and play better," Coughlin said. "There were times tonight when I thought our defense was playing outstanding, that they were the only thing we had keeping us competitively in the game. We had great stops after returns that were not enough. Not enough. And certainly that was obvious."