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EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — The sun was just beginning to slip below the rooftops of an ocean of vehicles in the parking lot Monday night at MetLife Stadium, and Todd Boresen already had the Korean-style barbecue steaks sizzling. It was several hours before kickoff between the Giants and the Minnesota Vikings, and the lots were quickly filling up. Boresen said he had no doubt that they would.
These are, undeniably, tough times for Big Blue fans, who have witnessed nearly two full months of N.F.L. play without a win yet for the Giants, the proud franchise's worst start since 1976. And a proud fan base mourns, but with acceptance.
"Disappointment is the word I would use," said Boresen, 36, of Woodbridge, N.J. "I'm not angry, I'm disappointed, because you always want to see your team win. When you only have one game a week and you look forward to it, you want to win."
In the parking lot throughout the night, conversation fluttered around which coach to terminate, which player to trade, which college star should be drafted in 2014. There were some fans who hoped the team went 0-16, ensuring a top spot in the upcoming N.F.L. draft, maybe to select the services of South Carolina defensive end Jadeveon Clowney. Other fans still believed they could reach the playoffs in a weak N.F.C. East.
Fans pointed to a potpourri of issues as the causes of failure this season. Both the offensive line and defensive line received votes, as did injuries, turnovers and coaching.
"They're not meshing well," said 82-year-old Alan Mantis, a season-ticket holder since 1957.
Mantis and a gang of his family and friends got their prime spot in Lot E by arriving just after four. They would spend the next few hours discussing what had befallen their beloved team.
"Maybe they're not running the right routes," Mantis said. "And pass protection has been a problem."
Cliff Papish, a friend, interjected with a reference to quarterback Eli Manning: "Eli's trying to do too much. There's no running game."
For the most part, fans remained optimistic and cheerful. But just in case, there was Ken Husband, 61, of Patchogue, N.Y., who brought a 3-foot-by-3-foot white sign that read, "Still #1 In Our Hearts" above the Giants' logo.
Husband had never before felt the need to devise a sign, never mind carry one around. But the sign attracted attention, even in a line for a piece of suckling pig, which was roasting on a spit, sponsored by a radio station.
The song "Party Rock Anthem" blared on speakers, and two barbershop chairs were set up so that daring fans could have a Giants-related emblem buzzed into their hair.
"They're just not clicking, you know?" said Husband's son, also named Ken. "They're good enough; it's just, that spark isn't there. They used to be able to turn it on, on a dime. They can't do that this year."
Said Lenny Iodice, 25, of West Caldwell, N.J.: "I'm to the point of 'just give me a win, that's all I want.' "
Mantis went further than just about anyone, calling the team's play through six games "a disgraceful performance."
"We don't expect to be in the Super Bowl every year, but we expect to be competitive," Mantis said. "We're not competitive. These games are blowouts."
Signs trumpeting the Super Bowl, to be played at MetLife Stadium in February, only seemed to make the fans even more upset about the team's lack of success.
"We had aspirations of playing in this game in February," said Josh Hubbard, 31, of Waterbury, Conn. "And now we're going to be finished in eight weeks. It's heartbreaking."
Have fans given up all hope? Hardly. Most expected a win over Minnesota on Monday, some even a blowout. Yankees closer Mariano Rivera was in attendance, which was interpreted as a fortunate omen.
"When you've won two Super Bowls in five or six years, it's hard to get angry," Boresen said. "We've had too much success recently to get angry. Because then you just sound greedy. Frustration? At times, sure."
Iodice, with two other younger Giants fans, Chris and Joelle, seemed resigned to the notion that playoff hopes look lost and the team's issues are plentiful. But glancing around at the festivities and the fan support, he felt renewed confidence.
"I think they're going to win tonight," Iodice said.
And if that did not happen?
"If they lose?" Iodice said. "Give me Clowney."
The N.C.A.A. will unveil the findings of its investigation into Miami athletics and any proposed sanctions Tuesday morning.
The findings will come about two and a half years after the probe began and more than eight months after the N.C.A.A. said the Hurricanes had not exercised institutional control over a former booster's interactions with the football and men's basketball programs.
Miami's football team is off to a 6-0 start, and the program's No. 7 ranking matches its highest since 2005.
Aj Mast/Associated Press
Reggie Wayne, who tore an anterior cruciate ligament, will be out the rest of the season.
The Indianapolis Colts' victory over Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos came at a hefty price. The Pro Bowl receiver Reggie Wayne, who had played in 189 consecutive games, was found Monday to have a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee that will cost him the rest of the season.
Quarterback Andrew Luck blamed himself for putting Wayne in harm's way with a low, underthrown ball late in Sunday's game against Denver.
"I think I feel sick to my stomach about it a little bit," Luck said.
Wayne was not hit on the play, but he clutched his right knee and stayed on the ground for several minutes before walking to the Colts' sideline.
Wayne, who will turn 35 next month, leads the team with 38 catches and 503 yards this season. In 13 seasons, all with the Colts, he has 1,006 receptions, 13,506 yards and 80 touchdown catches — second in each team category, behind only his ex-teammate, Marvin Harrison.
Coach Chuck Pagano said he believed Wayne would return next season.
"He's not going out like this. He's not going to leave this game like this. There's no way," Pagano said. "He'll fight, he'll get his surgery, and he'll rehab and he'll grind like nobody's ever grinded."
The Colts' offense has been battered. The starting tight end Dwayne Allen (hip), the top two running backs, Vick Ballard (knee) and Ahmad Bradshaw (neck), and the starting left guard Donald Thomas (quad) are on the season-ending injured reserve list. Wayne is expected to join them.
BRADFORD OUT FOR SEASON Rams quarterback Sam Bradford will have season-ending surgery for a torn ligament in his left knee. Bradford landed on his knee after being shoved out of bounds by Panthers safety Mike Mitchell in the fourth quarter of Sunday's loss at Carolina, which dropped St. Louis to 3-4
Kellen Clemens, who filled in for Bradford on Sunday, has been the only other quarterback on the roster. Austin Davis, released late in training camp, is a potential backup.
Bradford, the No. 1 overall pick in 2010, had 14 touchdown passes and 4 interceptions this season.
INJURIES MOUNT FOR BEARS Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler will miss at least the next four weeks and the Pro Bowl linebacker Lance Briggs will be out for about six weeks, a double blow for the struggling Bears.
Cutler tore a groin muscle during Sunday's loss to the Washington Redskins. Briggs left the game with a small fracture in his left shoulder. Neither player will need surgery.
"They're not done," Coach Marc Trestman said. "They're going to be back."
Cornerback Charles Tillman also left Sunday's game, with a knee injury, as Chicago (4-3) lost for the third time in four games.
GARRARD ON JETS ROSTER After a two-week tryout, David Garrard has won a spot on the Jets' active roster. The Jets swapped third quarterbacks, cutting Brady Quinn and activating Garrard, who will serve as a mentor for Geno Smith.
Garrard retired in May, two months after signing with the Jets, citing chronic left knee troubles. When his knee improved, Garrard reconsidered and joined the team on Oct. 10. Coach Rex Ryan, on his weekly spot on ESPN Radio, said Matt Simms would remain Smith's backup. BEN SHPIGEL
HOUSTON LOSES LINEBACKER The Texans' Pro Bowl linebacker Brian Cushing is out for the season with a left knee injury that will require surgery. Cushing was injured in the third quarter of Sunday's loss at Kansas City during a low block by running back Jamaal Charles. (AP)
INDICTMENT IN CHILD'S DEATH A South Dakota man accused in the death of the young son of Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson was indicted on second-degree murder and manslaughter charges. The authorities said that Joseph Robert Patterson, 27, assaulted 2-year-old Tyrese Robert Ruffin on Oct. 9 while the two were alone in a Sioux Falls apartment. Patterson is the boyfriend of the child's mother, they said. (AP)
AROUND THE LEAGUE Packers tight end Jermichael Finley suffered a significant neck injury and will be tested to determine the severity. ... Falcons running back Steven Jackson, who missed four games with a hamstring injury, is expected to practice on Wednesday. ... The Ravens sent tackle Bryant McKinnie to the Dolphins in exchange for a conditional late-round draft pick. (AP)
John Lok/The Seattle Times, via Associated Press
Don James coached the Huskies from 1975 to 1992 and became known locally as the Dawgfather for establishing Washington as a winning machine.
Don James, who as the football coach for the University of Washington for 18 seasons transformed a little-known program into a high-profile powerhouse that won four Rose Bowls and a share of the national championship, died on Sunday at his home in Kirkland, Wash. He was 80.
Warren Moon, with Don James, lead Washington to an upset win over Michigan in the 1978 Rose Bowl, and went on to have a Hall of Fame career in the National Football League.
The cause was pancreatic cancer, the university said.
James coached the Huskies from 1975 to 1992 and became known locally as the Dawgfather for establishing Washington as a winning machine. By the time he finished coaching at Washington, he had won 10 bowl games and had a 153-58-2 record. At the time, only Bear Bryant, Joe Paterno and Bobby Bowden had won more. (James is currently seventh on that list.)
His Huskies teams won the Rose Bowl in 1978, 1982, 1991 and 1992; won six conference championships; and finished in the Top 20 in the national rankings at least 11 times. In 1991, Washington went undefeated and shared the national championship with Miami. James won various coach-of-the-year honors, the first in 1977 and the last in 1991.
In 1975, James recruited a young quarterback from Southern California who had not received much attention from other big programs. The player, Warren Moon, was black; Washington had never had a starting black quarterback. James stuck with Moon amid early struggles and persistent racist heckling from home crowds. Moon became a star, leading Washington to an upset win over Michigan in the 1978 Rose Bowl, and went on to have a Hall of Fame career in the National Football League.
In a posting on Twitter on Monday, Moon said James was "probably the most influential person in my athletic and professional career."
Washington was still a force when James resigned in protest just before the 1993 season after the football program received stiff penalties from the Pacific-10 Conference for a range of violations, including excessive wages paid to players employed by boosters, free meals and poor accounting of money given to players to take recruits out to dinner. Most notably, quarterback Billy Joe Hobert, who led Washington to a share of the championship in 1991, was found to have received $50,000 in payments from a family friend.
James was not accused of improper conduct, but the program was described by James O'Fallon, the acting president of the conference, as having lost "institutional control." The penalties included scholarship reduction, a two-year ban on playing in bowl games and no television appearances for one year — punishment that James and some others at the university viewed as too severe.
"I have decided I can no longer coach in a conference that treats its players and coaches so unfairly," James wrote in his resignation letter.
There was little evidence that the scandal tainted his legacy. He was elected to the Husky Hall of Fame in 1994 and the College Football Hall of Fame in 1997. Long after he retired, he remained closely associated with the Washington football program, accompanying alumni groups on vacation tours and visiting practice every year. He addressed the team most recently in August.
James was known for being strict and meticulous and for building tough, gritty teams undaunted by the Northwest weather or by national expectations.
Alabama Coach Nick Saban, who played under James at Kent State in the early 1970s and became one his assistants there before James was hired at Washington, said in a statement on Sunday: "From an organizational standpoint, our program today is run much like he ran his program. He was very organized, efficient, and did an outstanding job of defining expectations for players, coaches and everyone in the organization."
Donald Earl James was born on Dec. 31, 1932, in Massillon, Ohio. He played quarterback at Miami, where he set numerous passing records, and was elected to the university's athletic hall of fame in 1992. He graduated in 1954, winning the team award for the senior with the best academic record.
He worked as an assistant at Kansas and received a master's degree in education there in 1957. After working as an assistant at Florida State, Michigan and Colorado, he was named the head coach at Kent State in 1971. He stayed there for four seasons, winning conference coach of the year in 1972 and leading Kent State to its first appearance in a bowl game that same season. His record at Kent State was 25-19-1.
His survivors include his wife of more than 60 years, the former Carol Hoobler; 3 children, Jeff, Jill Woodruff and Jeni Simmons; and 10 grandchildren.
"One great year doesn't make a tradition," James told The New York Times before the start of the 1992 season. "People think of Alabama, Texas, Ohio State, Michigan, Notre Dame. It would be nice to think we're included in that. But I think we've got to prove we can stay up there."
The Huskies went 9-3 that season, his last. Since then, their record is 125-122-1.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — From the start Monday night, it was obvious the Giants were going to be liberated from their winless misery.
The ball bounced their way at every turn. When Eli Manning threw an ill-advised pass — something he did at least twice — the ball was not intercepted but instead bounced harmlessly to the ground.
The Giants recovered two fumbles, something they had not done in a game this season. They led at halftime, another first for 2013. There was good Giants karma everywhere. The place-kicker for the opposing Minnesota Vikings missed a field goal — another first. as opposing kickers had been 14 for 14.
On Monday at MetLife Stadium, with the home crowd cheering and happy for the first time in nearly 300 days, it was as if the football gods said, Enough.
They let the Giants up. An 0-6 start to the season was sufficient humiliation.
Not long before midnight, the Giants had their first victory of the season, a 23-7 rout of the Vikings.
"It removes the stigma of having a zero at the front of your record, and it gives us renewed energy," wide receiver Victor Cruz said. "Everyone feels a little fresher, like the season is beginning again."
For the first time this year, there was music in the Giants' locker room after a game. And smiling faces. For a day at least, the gloom had been lifted.
"I think we have a shovel in our hands now," defensive end Justin Tuck said. "We can use it to dig ourselves out of the hole we've dug."
It would not be fair to call Monday's game an easy win — there is no such thing when your last victory came around Christmas in 2012 — but the Giants' performance against the Vikings was unforced and seemed to come to them naturally. Facing the hapless Vikings (1-5) certainly helped, but this first quality effort of the Giants season was not all luck and having the good fortune of playing a team without a bona fide quarterback.
Manning led the Giants on multiple efficient scoring drives without turning the ball over. Two running backs who until Monday had never carried the football for the Giants, Peyton Hillis and Michael Cox, gave the offense the much-needed balance it had lacked. The defense intercepted a pass, pressured Minnesota quarterback Josh Freeman and held the Vikings superstar running back Adrian Peterson to 28 rushing yards on 13 carries.
It was everything the previous six losses had not been. And while it may be irrelevant from a pragmatic sense, the 1-6 Giants are only three games out of first place in the N.F.C. East with nine games left on their schedule.
The tone for the game was set in the opening moments. Facing a third down and 5 at his own 21-yard line, Manning saw no receivers open and bolted up the middle of the field rather than force a throw into coverage. Avoiding one tackle, Manning gained 6 yards to pick up the first of 17 Giants first downs.
"On the first drive, you don't want to go three and out," said Manning, who looked at ease instead of anguished after the game for the first time this year. "It's important to do something with that drive. You get a first down, and the crowd gets involved and the sideline is excited."
The Giants kept the ball after Manning's scramble for 13 more plays, in a ball-control possession that lasted more than 9 minutes and featured seven rushing carries. The drive allowed the Giants to establish a dependable running game that set up the accurate third-down passing of Manning, who would complete 23 of 39 passes for 200 yards.
Unfortunately for the Giants, the first drive led only to a field goal, but at least the Giants were leading. To a winless team, a lead on the scoreboard is like an oasis in the desert.
Defensively, the tenor of the game was set on the opening Minnesota drive as well when the Giants held Peterson to zero rushing yards on his first two rushing carries and forced a Vikings punt. But when the Giants could not move the ball during their second possession — Manning did not see a wide-open Cruz in the middle of the field on third down — Steve Weatherford was called on and lofted a 51-yard punt within yards of the left sideline.
Minnesota's Marcus Sherels fielded the ball at his own 14-yard line just as Giants rookie Damontre Moore overran the punt and took himself out of the coverage. Sherels then had an unimpeded path upfield. No Giant came close to tackling him after the 50-yard line with the exception of Weatherford, who tugged at the neck of Sherels's jersey as he crossed the goal line for a touchdown.
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The former United States Open champion Webb Simpson cruised to his fourth career victory on the PGA Tour by a commanding six shots at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in Las Vegas.
On another calm and sunny day of ideal scoring conditions in the high Nevada desert, Simpson closed with a five-under-par 66 to post a 24-under total of 260.
Jason Bohn bogeyed the last hole for a 66 to share second place at 18 under with Japan's Ryo Ishikawa (65).
■ Amy Yang birdied the first playoff hole to beat her South Korean compatriot Hee Kyung Seo and win the KEB HanaBank Championship in Incheon, South Korea, for her first career title.
Michelle Wie finished tied for third at eight-under 208 with the defending champion Suzann Pettersen of Norway (70) and Sei Young Kim of South Korea (69). (AP)
■ Michael Allen won the Greater Hickory Classic in Conover, N.C., for his fourth Champions Tour title, beating Olin Browne with a birdie on the first hole of a playoff. Allen closed with a five-under 65, also birdieing the par-5 18th in regulation to match Browne at 13-under 197 at Rock Barn. (AP)
