If Sisi Mauigoa sees someone in a green and white No. 51 jersey running toward him in the Giants-Jets game Friday night, the rookie isn’t going to stop to think about all the good times they had growing up in the same island household and then get out of the way.
What’s he going to do instead?
“Pancake him,” Sisi said with a big grin. “Like the old days.”
The truth is that the middle two of the four Mauigoa brothers were mostly football teammates from childhood in American Samoa through college at Miami.
So, it will be a relatively new game experience with Sisi at right guard for the Giants and Kiko at linebacker for the Jets.
“It’s going to be special,” Sisi said. “It’s something new, but it’s also what we dream for. And to be able to go against him, he knows that I’m going to bring it. It’s going to be an extra juice behind it because I know that if he ever gets something on me, I will never hear the end of it.”
Sisi said he expects Kiko to take a shot at him if he has one — just like how their head-to-head battles at Miami were always high-level reps.
Their mother knows the physicality is coming, too, and that’s why it took extra convincing to get her to come from Florida to MetLife Stadium.
“I know it’s hard for my mom,” Sisi said. “She was hesitant. She doesn’t want to see us playing against each other. But I told her, ‘We’re not playing against each other. We’re playing for the same purpose of supporting our family.’ And now she’s going to book her flight and hopefully see her older son get pancaked by her younger son.”
Head coach John Harbaugh has not yet decided if QB Jaxson Dart will play against the Jets.
If Dart sits, he will have taken 27 days between game action leading up to Week 1 against the Cowboys.
“That’s a big factor,” Harbaugh said. “I don’t know if concern is the right word because a lot of teams do it, but you haven’t played in a game, now we’re going to go play in a game under the lights, high stakes. It’s going to be loud.”
If Dart plays, it won’t be much.
“So, how much is six plays, 10 plays, how much is that really worth?” Harbaugh said. “That’s part of the whole balancing act.”
Harbaugh also said the starting defense would benefit “from a communication standpoint” by playing.
The Giants signed TE Josiah Deguara and WR Kobe Prentice.
