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The Night the Lights Went Out in Jersey (VIDEO)

By ArtieFufkin

The New Meadowlands Stadium goes dark (AP Photo via NorthJersey.com)

UPDATE: Giants co-owner John Mara had the best quote of the night, from the NY Daily News:

“If I’d have known it would have ended like this, I would have kept the lights off.

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During the Giants 33-20 loss to the Cowboys today, viewers were treated to an eight-minute delay in the third quarter, after the lights went out at the New Meadowlands stadium. Apparently that $1.6 million they shelled out for the new building didn’t include the electric bill. Here’s video of the stadium going dim:

With the way the Giants – who had been everyone’s favorite pick to win the NFC this past week – were playing against the 1-7 Cowboys, the blackout seemed strangely symbolic. The previously fearsome New York defense made Jon Kitna (327 yards, 3 TDs) look like a hero, and seemed to be missing their spark all afternoon. And yeah, those two scores that were nullified by penalties didn’t help either. Overall, the Giants had 8 total penalties and 3 turnovers, and played about as dimly as they could under the circumstances.

There were technically two separate outages within moments of one another, and afterward, the Giants released a statement to explain what happened.  Via NJ.com:

“The New Meadowlands Stadium experienced two power outages in the 3rd quarter of tonight’s game. Power was lost when one of the two feeders to the stadium experienced a power interruption. The power source to the stadium was then switched to the second feeder. The appearance of the stadium not being at full power at that time occurred because the halogen lighting had not fully powered up. A second power interruption occurred to the second feeder causing a full outage.”

Yadda, yadda, yadda … the Giants blew it.