"There is, in an odd way, something comforting about the answers Tom Coughlin still gives, something reassuring about the plain, innocuous words that land in your notebook no matter how much care and how much thought you put into the question.

It has become obvious that the Giants, as a team, as an assemblage of players, relish the challenge of facing weekly assaults by opposing teams that invariably bring their highest "A" games against the defending champions. The bright targets planted on their backs have brought out the best in these athletes, week after week, game after game, and they have taken delight in rising to these challenges.

So here is what I wanted to know: Is it just as satisfying to be the coach of a team like this, a team that welcomes these weekly tests of mettle? Is it a different kind of thrill to have your own target painted on your own back, to be the hunted for a change instead of the hunter?

Coughlin answered the question. He talked about taking it one week at a time. He talked about how every game has its own set of challenges, how every game is of great significance, how every opportunity excites them, how the coaches are delighted to study every opponent to figure out what they have to do to put players in the best position to win. Then, to finish it up, he fastened a straight-man expression that would make Bud Abbott envious.

"I will give you the standard answer on that one," he said."