The Green Bay Packers walked off the field for the final time this season to a chorus of chants of "Let's Go, Giants!" Hey, it was better than the boos they heard at halftime. Fumbles, drops, missed assignments and blown coverages - Green Bay packed a year's worth of mistakes into a few hours Sunday, its dazzling season coming apart in a 37-20 loss to the New York Giants in the NFC divisional playoffs. Unbeatable only a month ago, Aaron Rodgers and the Packers had little response as Eli Manning and the Giants made themselves at home at Lambeau Field. "We got beat by a team that played better," Rodgers said. That's the reality of this league. (I've) been in the playoffs four times, and three times you lose your last game and you go home, and the one time you have that euphoric feeling that you keep fighting for. It's tough. I didn't think it was going to end tonight. End, though, it did. Instead of rolling toward a second straight Super Bowl, the defending champs are clearing out their lockers and scattering for the offseason. "No excuses," Packers coach Mike McCarthy said, refusing to blame the bye week or the heartache that followed the shocking death of offensive coordinator Joe Philbin's 21-year-old son. There was nothing in preparation that had led me to believe this was going to occur. Green Bay Packers' James Starks reacts on the bench late in the second half of an NFL divisional playoff football game against the New York Giants Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012, in Green Bay, Wis. Green Bay picked up right where it left off last season, winning its first 13 games to extend the streak that carried the Packers to their fourth Super Bowl title to 19 games, second-best in NFL history. The high-powered offense piled up points with a team-record 560, and Rodgers played so well that conversations about the league's best quarterbacks could no longer start with Tom Brady and end with Peyton Manning. But the defense was shaky, maligned all season for its penchant for giving up big plays, and its weaknesses were on full display against the Giants. The Packers were powerless to stop Manning, who threw for 330 yards and three touchdowns and coolly moved the Giants down the field drive after drive. Hakeem Nicks made the secondary look downright silly with 165 yards receiving and two touchdowns, the second of which he plucked out of the air above a scrum of Green Bay defenders just before halftime. "It's a hard play to swallow, a play that shouldn't happen," Charles Woodson said. The defense has to slow those guys coming off the ball, so that they're not running down the field free with an opportunity to get a steal. That play shouldn't have happened. As was the case other times this season, though, the defensive players didn't seem to be operating from the same playbook. On one play, Woodson was still talking to another defensive back when the Giants snapped the ball. But in the regular season, the offense was always there to bail the Packers out. This time, they were every bit as much of a problem. The Packers had hoped to win the game for Philbin, who was away from the team all week to mourn the death of his son Michael. Michael Philbin's body was recovered from an icy river in Oshkosh on Monday; a preliminary autopsy found that he drowned.