It is once again gameday for the Dallas Cowboys, a very quick turnaround off the shortest possible trip home from Houston in week four to hosting Tampa Bay here at the start of week five. These two games in five days don’t feel as daunting as they could have been.
Even though the Cowboys needed a ten-point comeback against the winless Texans on Sunday, the pass offense came to life to make the comeback, and now faces a highly-favorable matchup against the also-winless Buccaneers.
A win would give the
Cowboys a winning record for the first time since Week 13 of last year, their first winning streak of this 2026 season, and put them at 3-2 before Sunday to apply pressure to the 3-1 Giants who play at the Commanders, and the 2-2 Eagles, who are depleted and travel to London to play the Jaguars.
Let’s take our weekly look at what must happen for this to come true, or what the Bucs could do to get in the win column with a major Thursday Night Football upset.
The Dallas Cowboys will beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers if…
they give Dak Prescott time to throw.
When we say the pass offense won the game against the Texans, that doesn’t mean every element of it played well all game long. CeeDee Lamb was the most consistent part of this with his 17 catches and game-winning touchdown, George Pickens showed up more than he had all season, and Jake Ferguson plus Ryan Flournoy had clutch grabs at times too.
Dak Prescott orchestrated it all with deadly precision from the pocket, and did so despite the offensive line having some inconsistencies. Tyler Guyton was solid at left tackle, but Terence Steele had yet another up and down performance, and the interior line spent the first half getting pushed around a lot.
The Bucs have every reason under the sun to go all-out with their pressure packages on defense in this game, something they already prioritize under head coach Todd Bowles’ defensive coaching. They will be missing deep safety Antoine Winfield Jr., and don’t have the size or experience to matchup at cornerback either with the Cowboys receivers.
It feels like the only thing that can stop the Cowboys from pushing the ball downfield in this game is leaks in protection, and keeping the pocket clean for Prescott could see the offense break the scoreboard.
Tyler Smith will be making his season debut at left guard to help this cause, but the communication across the line will have to be clean to pick up blitzes. In any situation where the Cowboys are forced to check the ball down in the short passing game, the advantages are still there for Jake Ferguson or Javonte Williams against Tampa Bay’s linebackers.
Still, Dallas has struggled to get positive yardage out of these types of throws, so look for that to be an area they work on improving if they want to control the ball and tempo of this game much better than they could in Houston.
The Dallas Cowboys will lose to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers if…
they can’t contain Bucky Irving.
The one area that the Buccaneers have some outside hope to create a differential in this game between themselves and the Cowboys is in the interior run game. Starting RB Bucky Irving’s best runs have come on the interior.
It is easy to think of Irving as more of an outside the tackles, receiving type back, but his ability to be a home run hitter right between the tackles is special. Quinnen Williams and Kenny Clark showed up in pass rush against the Texans on the inside, but can this be the game they are even more stout against the run as well?
Irving led the team in carries and receptions in the Bucs’ Week 1 loss, catching all seven of his targets. He followed this up with another perfect game as a receiver in Week 2, going four for four, but more notably carrying the rock 17 times for 89 yards.
Week 3 against the Brian Flores’ Vikings defense is when the Buccaneers lost starting QB Baker Mayfield, and it led to a big dip in Irving’s threat in the passing game. In their first full game without Mayfield last week, UDFA QB Jalon Daniels didn’t even target Irving one time. He did rush 16 times for 61 yards, but only had a long run of seven yards.
For the Bucs to have enough of a foothold in this game to unlock the variety of ways they can use Bucky Irving at his best, it will have to start with calming the game down for Daniels making his second start and first on the road. The best way to do this would be gaining traction running it up the middle with Irving.
Staying in manageable down and distances can open up more space for Irving to be in the open field, where he can be a handful to tackle against a Cowboys defense that has room to grow here. It also could be the key to letting their mobile QB use his legs as well to frustrate Christian Parker’s defense.
If the Cowboys put the clamps on Irving, they will have a great chance to win this game. If not, the Buccaneers could find themselves right back in their fifth straight one-score game of the season, and this time steal it in Arlington.
