East Rutherford, N.J. ? Eli Manning might have poor stats in his second season, yet he has the New York Giants on the doorstep of the playoffs.

Manning has 15 interceptions and a completion percentage of 52.6 that rank at or near the bottom of the league. His accuracy will be a focus again today when New York (9-4) faces Kansas City (8-5) at Giants Stadium in a crucial game for both teams’ postseason aspirations.

A victory by New York and a Washington victory over Dallas on Sunday would give the first-place Giants a chance to clinch the NFC East on Saturday at Washington.

The Chiefs are in a dogfight with Jacksonville (9-4), San Diego (8-5) and Pittsburgh (8-5) for an AFC wild-card spot. Kansas City plays host to San Diego on Saturday.

Sunday, Manning was 28-for-44, but threw three late interceptions that forced the Giants to go to overtime to beat a depleted Philadelphia Eagles team. Today, he’ll likely have to operate with starting tackles Luke Petitgout and Kareem McKenzie out with injuries.

Manning said his confidence wasn’t shaken by the late-game collapse.

New York Giants QB Eli Manning looks for a receiver in this file photo from Oct. 23 in East Rutherford, N.J. Manning will attempt to lead the Giants past the Chiefs in a crucial game for both teams' playoff aspirations at 4 p.m. today in East Rutherford.

“I thought for the most part that I played a pretty good game except for the last couple of minutes,” he said. “It’s just a matter of taking a few throws away, and it would have been a pretty good game, and that’s the difference. But you can’t have mental breakdowns. You can’t have bad plays in this league.”

Kansas City defensive end Jared Allen, who leads the team with 10 sacks, thinks Manning can be forced into mistakes.

“He’s thrown quite a few interceptions, but he’s also made quite a few great plays,” Allen said. “We’ve got to force him into bad situations. Both their starting tackles are out, and we’ve got to take advantage of that. But we’ve got to stop (running back) Tiki Barber first and put them in a position to throw and then get after them.”

Despite Manning’s accuracy problems, only Indianapolis, Cincinnati, San Diego and Seattle have scored more points than the Giants. But the big plays that were a part of the passing game earlier in the season have dwindled. Of the Giants’ 40 pass plays of more than 20 yards this season, only three have come in their last two games.

Some of that can be attributed to weather and a greater reliance on running the ball, but that theory can’t explain why the Chiefs have had 15 plays of 20-plus yards in their last three games after managing only five in their previous three.

Not surprisingly, the Chiefs have won three of their last four games and quarterback Trent Green is third in the NFL with 3,287 yards passing. The secret, according to Green, has been balancing the run and pass.

“When you look back to the Buffalo game (a 14-3 loss on Nov. 13), we tried leaning on the run too much and we got ourselves in a lot of third-down situations that we weren’t able to produce,” he said. “I think we were 1-for-11 in third downs that game, and you’re not going to have much success when that’s the scenario. What we’ve been able to do these last four games is just create more balance.”

History won’t be on the Chiefs’ side today: They have lost eight of 10 to the Giants dating back to 1974, and most recently, in 2001, in the Giants’ emotional first game after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.