Manning brothers square off

INDIANAPOLIS – He will always be Peyton Manning’s little brother. But with a Super Bowl ring of his own, and coming off the best season, statistically, of his career, New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning has done enough to step out of the long shadow cast by his All-Pro brother.

The two will meet today (NBC, 5 p.m.) for the second time on an NFL field, four years after the Colts and Giants faced each other at the old Meadowlands stadium.

Eli, for one, is happy this meeting comes in Week 2 instead of in the opener, as it did in 2006.

“In 2006, it was overload because right when people found out we were playing the game in April, we got questions about it,” he told reporters this week. “You get sick of answering the same question over and over for five months.”

He said this week has been “a little bit less stressful” for the brothers, and “we can think about it and enjoy this game and enjoy the fact that we both will be on the field.”

It helps Eli that the Giants are coming off a 31-18 victory over Carolina in which he passed for 263 yards and three touchdowns.

There’s more pressure on the Colts, who lost at Houston and gave up 257 yards on the ground.

Given his druthers, Eli won’t be throwing the ball as much in this game, and the Giants can establish a better running game than they did in Week 1, when they rushed for 118 yards.

Of course, as Eli pointed out, the running and passing games are closely linked.

“If you can throw well on first and second down, you can get into a two-high safety zone, and you can run it some and then get into third-and- manageable situations,” he said.

“If you’re facing third-and-longs, that’s when their defense comes alive and those defensive ends are sprinting up the field and it makes for a long day.”