The Dallas Cowboys lost on Thursday night. It remains incredibly frustrating.
If I asked you for the most contentious decision that the coaching staff made in the process, you would likely bring up the decision that Brian Schottenheimer made to go for two when down by eight in the fourth quarter. This particular author supported that for what it’s worth, just about the only thing I endorsed from Schottenheimer throughout the loss.
While that decision has inspired a lot of responses there is another
Cowboys coaching decision that merits discussion. This one came much earlier in the game.
Almost halfway through the second quarter, Dak Prescott and CeeDee Lamb failed to connect on a 3rd and 10. It was 4th and 10, obviously, and the Cowboys chose to punt.
The thing is the Cowboys were on the Tampa Bay 47-yard line. They turned down a 64-yard field goal attempt, something that Brandon Aubrey is regarded to be very good at.
Aubrey hasn’t exactly been super reliable on these as of late, though. He had a 59-yard attempt blocked by the Baltimore Ravens, and a week later he had a 62-yard attempt blocked by the Houston Texans. Schottenheimer also chose to have Aubrey attempt a 65-yarder against Houston on the possession after the block and he missed it outright. In the week after the game, Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans talked about how they were partly able to block the kick they did because of something they saw on film from Dallas’ game against Baltimore.
You never want to see this kind of thing. It looks bad on the Cowboys, it looks bad on Schottenheimer, and it specifically looks bad on special teams coordinator Nick Sorensen.
Did those two blocks occupy some rent in the Cowboys’ minds on the decision to not let Aubrey attempt the 64-yarder against Tampa? It is hard to say not. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s Nick Harris pulled the last time that Dallas punted from across the 50-yard line and it was midway through last year, but the last time they punted from inside of the 47-yard line specifically was late in the 2024 season. It is worth noting that by that time in that season Dak Prescott was out for the year already so the calculus was a bit different.
To be clear, it is impossible to say with full certainty that the Cowboys punted because of a lack of faith in any one person or side of the ball. But it is certainly a legitimate theory. That particular decision was hardly costly. The Buccaneers went on the punt themselves so there was no blood drawn.
But what if Aubrey had attempted the 64-yard attempt? What if he had made it? Then the Cowboys could have gone for two when they did in an effort to make the game (at that time) a three-point contest. And if they had gotten it, they didn’t get it as we all know, then they would have only needed a field goal to tie at the end of regulation. That is a lot of ifs and hypotheticals, but they rest on the decision that Dallas made to not have Brandon Aubrey attempt the field goal.
What do you think? Was it a lack of faith? Or something random?
