Is it possible the Giants miscalculated when they decided to ride into this season with the same guards they had on the roster in 2022?

One game in, the answer appears to be yes.

One game, of course, does not a season make.

It is far too early to be coming up with declarative statements about anything specific with this Giants team — other than the undeniable fact that their season-opening 40-0 loss to the Cowboys was a humbling experience from start to finish.

The Giants did not have money to burn in free agency, and they were not looking to bring in expensive interior offensive linemen.

Should they have made a run at Isaac Seumalo (who got three years, $24 million from the Steelers) or Ben Powers (four years, $51 million from the Broncos), or given a short-term deal to Trai Turner (one year, $3 million from the Commanders)?

Should the Giants simply have re-signed Nick Gates, who went to the Commanders (for three years and $16.5 million) and is currently starting at center, though he has experience at guard?

Instead, what general manager Joe Schoen and his front office did was select John Michael Schmitz in the second round of the NFL Draft to fill the need for a starting center and then … decided to stick with the group already assembled at guard.

The decision to run it back with the same group of guards could turn out to be a big mistake.

Three options at the position — Jack Anderson, Wyatt Davis and Tyre Phillips — did not make it out of the preseason because of injuries. Of that group, only Phillips had a strong shot to make the roster.

The expectation around the team was Josh Ezeudu would win the starting left guard job after a summer competing with Ben Bredeson. This current regime selected Ezeudu in the third round of the 2022 draft and believed he might have surged into the lineup as a rookie if not for a late-season neck injury. That he did not out-play Bredeson in training camp this summer is, if not alarming, certainly concerning.

Given the many areas the Schoen and Co. have been trying to address since taking over, the line is still a work in progress.

Three of the five starters — the entire right side — are Schoen imports. Much like this year, there was not much money available to spend in free agency in 2022, and Schoen used most of it on Mark Glowinski, handing the veteran a three-year deal worth $18.3 million to start at right guard.

Glowinski, 31, had his hands full facing the Cowboys’ interior pass rushers on Sunday night, and he and right tackle Evan Neal, to put it mildly, did not exactly work magic together.

And while Schmitz arrived from Minnesota a well-seasoned first-year player, it is far too early to determine what the 24-year-old rookie will be.

He was disappointed in himself for bouncing a shotgun snap to Daniel Jones, resulting in a 14-yard loss and setting in motion a field-goal attempt from hell, a blocked kick that handed the Cowboys a 6-0 lead.

Despite the heavy rain making the ball slick, Schmitz did not cut himself any slack.

“That’s on me,’’ he said. “I shouldn’t let the circumstances dictate my behavior at all, no matter if it’s raining, sleeting, cold, hot. Shouldn’t let that affect anything with my snap. Got to be better.’’

He’s not alone.

Neal, drafted No. 7 overall last year, was abused last season in his first game against the Cowboys and was dominated for much of this one as well.

It is not an overstatement to put the former Crimson Tide lineman at the top of the “he needs to be really good’’ list to make this all work. At the very least, a top-10 pick has to develop into a solid starter — and sooner rather than later.

A franchise cannot overcome a premium draft choice devolving into a bust. And though it is unfair to stick Neal with that label just yet, it is fair to wonder if he has what it takes to get there.

Indeed, there was no reason to anticipate Neal channeling Teddy Roosevelt by dropping a “man in the arena’’ reference as he described his rough performance.

“Obviously, as a competitor, being a man in the arena, going out there putting everything on the line, all the hard work it takes to be able to go out there and perform, and to have a result like that, obviously, it sucks, but what can you do?’’ Neal said. “What can you do other than come out and work harder, go back in the office, learn from it and work harder to make sure it doesn’t happen again?’’

After one game, the entire offensive line has a lot of work to do. Some things never change.

The 40-point loss in the opener was so historically bad that there are all sorts of tidbits that reflect how unique the game was. Here are a few of them:

• If it felt as if the Giants’ 16-0 deficit after one quarter was unusually steep, that feeling was warranted. It was their largest deficit after one quarter in 17 years, since they were down 21-0 in Seattle on Sept. 24, 2006.

• The 26-0 halftime deficit was the largest for the Giants in a regular-season game since they trailed in Minnesota 31-0 at the half on Jan. 3, 2010. It was not long ago — on Jan. 21 — that the Giants were down 28-0 at halftime in an NFC divisional playoff game in Philadelphia.

• It is always interesting to look back and see how young players were viewed as rookies and how their careers turned out.

The Giants started three rookies against the Cowboys — Schmitz plus cornerbacks Deonte Banks and Tre Hawkins. That was hailed in some circles as a victory for the 2023 NFL Draft class, but only time will tell whether that is indeed the case.

The last time the Giants started three rookies in a season opener was in 2018, when running back Saquon Barkley, guard Will Hernandez and defensive lineman B.J. Hill were in the lineup in a 20-15 loss to the Jaguars.

Barkley is coming off a career-best 1,312-yard rushing season. Hernandez, after four uneven years with the Giants, is in his second year starting for the Cardinals. And Hill did not do a whole heck of a lot in his three seasons with the Giants, but landed in Cincinnati and is a starter for the rugged Bengals defense.

Want to catch a game? The Giants schedule with links to buy tickets can be found here.

Why was Daniel Jones still on the field and taking hits late in the game with the Giants down by 40 points?

It’s a good question. Coach Brian Daboll explained that he wanted Jones and the starting offense to get a taste of even the smallest morsel of success, so he kept his starters in the game until finally relenting and replacing Jones with Tyrod Taylor in the final minute.

“Try to get something positive going there,’’ Daboll said.

It did not materialize. Jones was sacked three times on his last offensive series.

From our vantage point, it seemed like limiting the risk of injury should have superseded the desire to have Jones complete a few passes to allow the Giants to avoid getting shut out.

Jones’ presence on the field, darn-near until the bitter end, caught the attention of Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons, who sacked Jones in the first quarter. Parsons gave Daboll’s move a thumbs-down.

“It’s called protecting your guys,’’ Parsons said on “The Edge With Micah Parsons” podcast. “It’s something I thought the Giants should have done. I don’t think Daniel Jones should have been in that game in the fourth quarter. I thought they should have protected him and pulled him out … their season would be over without Daniel Jones. The Bengals did the smart decision by pulling Joe Burrow, saying, ‘Hey, we’re going to submit, we’re going to take our loss and we’re going to move onto next week and get better.’ That’s the best thing you can do.

“I do not agree with Daniel Jones staying out there until that last drive. I thought that was wrong, I thought that was deceiving. That’s your franchise quarterback and he’s still out there with the backup offensive line, still getting sacked and hit. I just didn’t understand it. Maybe it was a prove-it moment by the Giants, I have no idea, a learning lesson, who knows?’’

Should the Giants, desperate to glean anything positive out of that disaster of a season opener, be at least a bit encouraged by the way their defense kept the Cowboys’ attack somewhat in check?

After all, Dak Prescott threw for just 143 yards and no touchdowns, the Cowboys did not run wild (122 rushing yards) and, other than a 49-yard pass completion on a busted coverage, the Giants did not allow a Dallas receiver a completion of more than 16 yards. The Cowboys’ 265 yards is a more than acceptable total for a defense to allow.

Well, hold that praise. It started raining just before kickoff and continued to varying degrees all game. Based on the conditions, the Cowboys went conservative on offense.

“We went to a weather plan,’’ Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy said. “Really, pregame was actually pretty nice. We were all hoping to stay that way, but that wasn’t the case. I think the field was getting soft, too. … At the end of the day, the team that was protecting the ball was going to win the game. That’s how I felt once the rain really came. We had a couple of spots here where it was pretty continuous. So yeah, the biggest change was just going into the rain plan.’’

In other words, the Cowboys were more concerned about ball security than they were about amassing all sorts of points against the Giants, especially after racing to a big early lead. Combined with the Giants’ mistakes, the Cowboys did not need to go into full-blown attack mode. We’ll see if they need to the next time they face the Giants.

Here are two questions that have come up recently that we will attempt to answer as accurately as possible:

After the 40-point loss, how much of a must-win is the Week 2 game in Arizona?

Look at it this way: Let’s say the Giants played a competitive game against the Cowboys and lost, 24-20. The narrative would have been different, but they still would have been 0-1 and needing to win the next game against a weak Cardinals team.

As embarrassing as losing 40-0 was for the Giants, it only counted as one loss.

They took a big hit in the credibility department, rightfully so. There is no quick-spray option to deodorize the stench of that performance.

But if the Giants beat the Cardinals, they will be 1-1, and that is where many fans and observers expected them to be after two games.

What was the deal with ball security against the Cowboys?

It was lousy. “I think seven times the ball was either in their hands or on the ground,’’ Daboll said, referring to two interceptions thrown by Jones and five fumbles by the Giants. Yes, the Giants recovered four of the five fumbles, but that is lipstick on a pig.

This was an ugly display, reinforcing that the Cowboys were the more forceful, physical and instinctive team. The Giants lost the turnover battle, 3-0, and it is nearly impossible to win a game with a minus-three turnover differential.