Raiders report: Rich Bisaccia prepares to face favorite team

RAIDERS REPORT

Schedule

All practices at Intermountain Healthcare Performance Center, unless noted:

■ Saturday — Off

■ Sunday — at New York Giants, Met Life Stadium, East Rutherford, New Jersey, 10 a.m.

■ Monday — Off

■ Tuesday — Off

■ Wednesday — Practice, 11:30 a.m.

■ Thursday — Practice, 11:30 a.m.

■ Friday — Practice, 11:30 a.m.

■ Saturday — Off

■ Sunday — vs. Kansas City Chiefs, Allegiant Stadium, 5:2o p.m.

Quote of the day

The New York Giants have been a big part of Raiders’ interim coach Rich Bisaccia’s life for as long as he can remember.

He even has a favorite joke he likes to tell about his dad being the coach of the Giants in his own mind.

As Bisaccia prepared Friday to fly across the country to take on his childhood favorite team for the first time as a head coach, he downplayed the personal significance.

“If I told you my history with the Giants, you’d laugh,” he said. “I try to do it with that joke about my dad. Fortunately for me at this particular point in my career, we’ve played them so many times that I‘ve had an opportunity to just treat it as another game. Maybe that’s fortunate for me. But I do love the Giants as long as we’re not playing them.”

Injury report

The Raiders made it through the week healthy. They don’t have a single player with an injury designation headed into Sunday’s game against the Giants.

“We’ve actually gone through the whole week and nobody got tripped up,” Bisaccia said. “We’re all good to go.”

The Giants aren’t as fortunate.

Star running back Squon Barkley has cleared COVID protocols, but has officially been ruled out for the fourth straight game with an ankle injury. Wide receivers Dante Pettis (shoulder) and Sterling Shepard (quad) are both out as well. Fellow receivers John Ross (quad) and Kenny Golladay (knee) got in limited practice sessions on Friday and are questionable to play.

Linebacker Lorenzo Carter and defensive back Nate Ebner will both miss the game with ankle injuries.

Leaning on experience

Bisaccia took over as interim coach last month during one of the most tumultuous weeks in the history of the franchise.

He barely had time to settle in before things got even worse with one of his now-former players facing charges of DUI causing death and thoughts and prayers around the team facility and the city focused on Tina Tintor, the woman who died in the crash.

Bisaccia has shown steady leadership in somehow keeping the team on track with a pair of victories and will look to keep the streak going on Sunday.

“I’m 61 years old,” he said. “I’d like to think along the way, you gain some wisdom and some experience. You go through things whether it’s the family I grew up with or the family of my own now, then being around a lot of players.

“You’d like to think you learn from them and you’d like to think you can improve and keep moving forward. That’s the message we try to give our players, and you try to live that way to some degree if you can. I just think we all try to learn.”

Through the chaos of the last few weeks, the time on the field has served as some of the only respites. As much as the focus is and should be on the tragic events of this week, the sobering reality is that life moves on, and football is life for the Raiders.

“They’re pro football players and what do you expect a pro football player to do?” Bisaccia said. “Play football and practice football and prepare to play football. … I just know we’re excited about the opportunity to play football again and get on a plane today and get ready to play on Sunday.”

Old friend

With Barkley out of the game, former Raider Devontae Booker will get the bulk of the work at running back for the Giants.

Bisaccia said he doesn’t expect much drop-off at the position.

“We had Booker here and had a great love affair with him,” he said of the running back who spent the 2020 season with the Raiders. “Not only was he a heck of a running back, but he played on (special) teams and did a lot of things. If you look at the Kansas City game the other night, he had a tremendous game whether he was running inside or running the stretch. Then he’s big in the passing game and in the screen game. We’re really preparing to play against a really good back regardless of who’s back there.”

Adam Hill Las Vegas Review-Journal