Giants looking forward to season-opening game and home crowd

MetLife Stadium opened in 2010 with not one but two teams sharing tenancy, yet somehow it has managed to host only one Giants or Jets playoff game.

One! In 13 seasons!

The Giants played the Falcons in a wild-card game there after the 2011 season.

There have been exciting moments, but considering the number of games, not enough. The building’s much-criticized vibe and architecture have not helped.

But perhaps this will be the season MetLife breaks through as the place to be in New York sports, starting with a pair of nationally televised openers on Sunday and Monday.

The Jets get the Bills on Monday night. The Giants are up first, with the archrival Cowboys in town Sunday night.

“We’re abusing that field,” Giants cornerback Adoree’ Jackson said of the big nights ahead.

He said it reminds him of when he was at Southern Cal and USC shared the Los Angeles Coliseum with the Rams. Only this time, it’s on MetLife’s new turf instead of USC’s grass.

“Hopefully they’ll do some cooking; get that food ready,” Jackson said with a smile. “Those fans are going to be drunk and hungry — drunk and hungry, boss.”

Jackson spoke in a loose and loud post-practice locker room, with two ping-pong games going. If the Giants are nervous, they are not showing it.

Coach Brian Daboll has been focused for months on preparing his team, of course. But before practice on Friday, he sought to prepare the fans, too.

“I just hope we go out there and play a good game,” he said. “Hope the fans are out here early and tailgating and then get in their seats early and they’re as loud as can be.”

Crowds for night games tend to skew younger and, well, looser than at 1 p.m. The last time MetLife fans saw the Giants in the flesh in a game that mattered, they routed the Colts, 38-10, on Jan. 1 to clinch their first playoff spot since 2016.

A mismatch of that proportion is unlikely Sunday; fans would happily settle for a one-point victory.

Daboll said the first game of the season still “absolutely” excites him after all his years in the sport. He called it one of his favorite games.

“It’s the start of the season, a lot of unknowns,” he said. “You get to go out there and play a real game, coach in a real game, deal with adversity. It’s always exciting.”

He said he had his captains speak to the team’s younger players early in the week about what to expect and how to prepare for it.

Jackson is in his seventh season in the NFL and third with the Giants, so he has a pretty good idea.

“The [fans] are going to be up,” he said. “They ain’t going to be sleepy. It’s going to be nice. It’s going to be a cool atmosphere at night, at home, in front of the fans.”

As he said, they are hungry.

Gano extended. The Giants announced they have signed kicker Graham Gano, 36, to a three-year contract extension. He is 89-for-97 on field goals in three seasons with the Giants, and his 91.8 field-goal percentage is the best in franchise history for kickers who spent more than one season with Big Blue.

By Neil Best

neil.best@newsday.com@sportswatch

Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.