Giants have ‘ultimate confidence’ in lefty Ben Sauls taking over kicking duties

The Giants' kicking carousel continues.

With Graham Gano still on IR and Younghoe Koo cut this week, New York will be turning things over to their fourth kicker this season for Sunday's meeting with the Vikings.

Rookie Ben Sauls is expected to be elevated to make his NFL debut.

Though Sauls is the most inexperienced kicker Big Blue has run out this season, they are confident after working with him over the past couple of weeks.

He's wise beyond his years," special teams coordinator Michael Ghobrial said. From his days at Pitt, Coach Narduzzi did a great job, then part of that is also being able to kick in an NFL stadium, I think, has also allowed him to grow up quicker.

From when he's showed up here, he's worked his tail off -- he's gotten operations with the specialists, so this won't be new to him. He's excited for the opportunity and we have ultimate confidence in him."

Sauls was one of the NCAA's top kickers during his five years at Pitt.

He earned All ACC honors once, drilled 52 of his 64 attempts, missed just two of his 124 career extra points, and still holds the school record for consecutive field goals made (15).

Still, the left-footed kicker went undrafted this offseason.

He signed to the Steelers' practice squad and made five of six attempts during the preseason, but ended up being cut before joining the Falcons.

Sauls remained with Atlanta but was cut in early November before he was ever elevated to the active roster, then was scooped up by Big Blue a week later.

He'll likely have the final two games to make his mark with the struggling special teams unit.

We've been preparing a long time," Sauls said. I've been around a lot of vets and they've really shown me the ropes of how to be a guy who comes in late in the year and hopefully goes in full stride and comes in late.

"I'm just going to rely on the experience of Jamie [Gillian] and Casey [Kreiter], go out, swing my leg and make a lot of kicks."