PRO FOOTBALL : Giants Beat Cards, Eye Home-Field Advantage

It might be a little premature, but the New York Giants are convinced the road to the Super Bowl is going through Giants Stadium this season.

The NFC East champion Giants Sunday took the next-to-last step toward earning the home-field advantage for the playoffs by defeating the St. Louis Cardinals, 27-7, behind a record-setting 3-touchdown, 179-yard rushing performance by Joe Morris, who broke his own single-season club rushing record.

New York, which won its first division title in 23 years on Saturday when the Denver Broncos defeated the Washington Redskins, 31-30, can clinch the home-field for the playoffs next Saturday by defeating the Green Bay Packers.

“The road to Pasadena is through the Meadowlands, and that’s the way it’s going to be,” Giant center Bart Oates said. “We got Green Bay next week. That’s the game we’re going to concentrate on and that’s the team we’re going to beat. It’s as simple as that.”

Actually the team the Giants are thinking about is the defending Super Bowl champion Chicago Bears, who are battling the Giants for the home-field edge. The Giants want to play the Bears in the playoffs, but in New York.

Said Giant nose tackle Jerome Sally: “Last year the road to the Super Bowl went through Chicago, and everybody had to go into their backyard. That’s what we’re shooting for, we’re tired of going on the road.”

The victory was the eighth straight for the Giants (13-2), who were eliminated from last year’s playoffs by the Bears in the NFC semifinals.

St. Louis Coach Gene Stallings said the Giants will challenge the Bears.

“It’s going to take a good team to beat the Giants,” Stallings said. “They’re a Super Bowl team.”

New York made quick work of the Cardinals, who fell to 3-11-1 under first-year coach Stallings and are on the verge of their worst season since moving to St. Louis in 1960.

New York built a 17-0 halftime lead on touchdown runs of two and three yards by Morris and a 26-yard field goal by Raul Allegre just before halftime.

Morris, who tainted his performance by fumbling three times, now has rushed for 1,401 yards breaking the mark of 1,336 he set last season. Morris got his third touchdown with less than two minutes to go on a one-yard run that he set up one play earlier with a 49-yard scamper.

It was Morris’ seventh 100-yard rushing game this season.

Allegre, who was signed in the fourth week of the season and has solidified New York’s kicking game by hitting 22 of 30 field goal attempts, added a 23-yard effort in the third quarter.

St. Louis scored with 6:37 to play on a 15-yard halfback option pass from Stump Mitchell to Roy Green.

Meanwhile the Giants’ defense was making life miserable for Cardinal quarterback Neil Lomax, sacking him 7 times in the first 30 minutes for 60 yards in losses.

On St. Louis’ seven first-half possessions, it had positive yardage on just two of them, and one series ended with Lomax being sacked three straight times.