The Dallas Cowboys ended their losing streak to the Green Bay Packers on Sunday night? Without a win? For the first time in this rivalry’s history, the two teams tied, and nobody has any idea how to feel
about it. Week’s worth of drama leading into this game because of Micah Parsons switching sides from America’s Team to the Packers, a primetime matchup of two sides coming off of bad early season losses, a second straight overtime home game for Dallas, and a tie. Sunday night will go down as one of the wackiest Cowboys games in a long, long time.
The game started in a way many of the home fans feared, with Green Bay rolling offensively and putting Dallas in an early hole to force them into Dak Prescott hero ball. Luckily for Brian Schottenheimer’s team, Prescott was ready to put on his superman cape and answer this call, but so too was Jordan Love for the Packers. In the spirit of having a new result in a series between two historic teams that first met all the way back in 1960, this game easily could have had three different headlines before arriving at a mostly unsatisfying conclusion.
Early on the Cowboys seemed destined to fall to 1-3 and compound their road loss to the Bears with another week of negativity towards playoff hopes, the entire operation on defense, and Prescott’s ability to win games. Once the Cowboys got on the board in the strangest of ways, a blocked extra point returned for two points, they rallied to take the lead before halftime. The Cowboys didn’t score on the first possession of the second half to build on this lead, but as the game went back and forth from here they did reclaim the lead four more times. At any of these points, the headline of this game was tantalizingly close to the Cowboys having a signature win for Schottenheimer. The Cowboys defense was unable to get a single stop in the second half or overtime though, and hung on for dear life to get a tie.
Sunday night was also the first time the Cowboys have scored 40 points in a game and not won outright since 2013 versus the Broncos. This was another classic from Arlington, as Peyton Manning and Tony Romo dueled to a 51-48 Denver win.
To this day, that Broncos-Cowboys game is remembered as one of the most obvious examples of how bad Cowboys defenses let Romo down throughout his career. To a much lesser extent, the Cowboys defense let Prescott down against the Packers here in week four, but at least did just enough to not lose yet another backbreaker to an opponent that’s had their number. Whether or not this Packers game feels more like a win or a loss is still up in the air though.
Before moving on to the first of two visits to MetLife Stadium this season for the Cowboys looming in week five, let’s try to make some sense of what happened in this 40-40 tie versus the Packers.
The Cowboys defense promised changes coming into this game after such a flat performance against a Bears team that shredded them for huge plays and 31 points, and even though the results were hardly better, the changes certainly were noticeable. Matt Eberflus’ group made a change in the rotation at cornerback, relying more on Kaiir Elam, DaRon Bland, and Reddy Steward to be every down players, and using Trevon Diggs rotationally.
How many layers there were to this decision remains to be seen, with Diggs nursing an injury all week in practice, but also not a scheme fit to play the amount of zone this new defense calls for. To make matters much worse, Diggs’ man coverage reps alone this season may have been enough to deter Eberflus from calling any man at all – something that is already a rarity for Dallas right now -as he’s been beat off the line of scrimmage for easy scoring passes. Whatever disciplinary or purely matchup reasons are baked into the Cowboys plan at cornerback from this game, credit is deserved towards Diggs who handled it well and nearly came up with the first interception by a Cowboys corner this season in the first half. It also may have been the key for Dallas being more willing to mix in a blend of both man and zone concepts.
After DaRon Bland had already given up the opening touchdown of the game to Romeo Doubs, Diggs had an interception called back with Dallas being caught with 12 defenders on the field. The Packers would capitalize throwing to Doubs again, this time working against Elam, to jump ahead 13-0 in the first half. Not having Diggs on the field as a potential easy target against the amount of misdirection and double moves the Packers are capable of running backfired early, as Bland and Elam also could not hold up in coverage, and Green Bay did what they do best in dictating these matchups on the outside. Diggs did settle into this new role nicely though and make plays throughout the night, possibly by catching the Packers by surprise as to when he would be out there or not.
The Cowboys have not seen as much of Diggs and Bland on the field together as they could hope for, but both corners were on the field in overtime for a long third-down incompletion by Love downfield to Dontayvion Wicks. This set up Dallas’ best opportunity to escape this game with a win, needing a fourth-down stop with the ball in Packers territory. This time however, Diggs was playing off in coverage and with outside leverage guarding against the deep ball that could set the Packers up for a winning touchdown. Speedy rookie receiver Matthew Golden got an easy release to the middle of the field, and once again became an open receiver that a Dallas linebacker had no chance of getting to, as he settled into the middle of the field and moved the chains. Diggs would come back to get the best of Golden at the start of the red zone sequence that led to the tying field goal, making a tackle for loss on a screen play with under a minute to play. This forced the Packers to use their last timeout. It nearly cost them the game with a running clock later on third down they only stopped with one second remaining on an incompletion in the back of the end zone that bounced off of Jack Sanborn.
It will be highly interesting to see if the Cowboys have found something further with Diggs coming on and off the field, as their depth elsewhere at cornerback improves with players like Shavon Revel and Caelen Carson available.
The negative plays from the Cowboys defense in this game may have been few and far between, but once again even the slightest sign of putting an opposing offense behind the sticks led to better results. Unfortunately, it also led to penalties that extended Packers drives and directly led to points. The Cowboys offense punted on their first three drives of this game, the third of which never got off the ground because of offensive penalties. The fact the Cowboys even got to overtime after conceding points at will to start the game and running a fullback draw on third and long to punt the ball back to the Packers without evidence they could stop them at this point was something of a miracle.
The Packers first chance to potentially go up three scores was pushed back by rookie edge rusher Donovan Ezeiruaku stopping Golden on a handoff for a loss, but he was also called for a personal foul after the play for throwing a punch. On this occasion, the Cowboys stiffened up again and forced one of two Packers’ punts on the night, which was all the offense needed to make a splash play and connect with George Pickens to the one-yard line, and finish the drive with a Prescott rushing touchdown to pull within 13-9. The defense continued to feed off this momentum and set themselves up nicely with a negative play on the next drive, this time ending the drive themselves on James Houston’s strip sack on Love. Prescott found Pickens in one play off of the sudden change for the go-ahead touchdown, and the Cowboys led 16-13.
This touchdown was just one slight example of Schottenheimer being in his bag calling the plays, as the pre-snap motion from Javonte Williams out of the backfield to receiver helped Pickens get a free release up the middle of the field, and catch his first of two touchdowns.
The Cowboys defense could create no such momentum in the second half though, where another costly penalty led to another Packers touchdown. The defensive changes for Dallas in this game did not just apply to the secondary, as Marist Liufau got more run at one of the linebacker spots. Damone Clark was inactive in this game, but Kenneth Murray and Jack Sanborn were still on the field plenty and actually lined up on the strong side of a power formation together for a Josh Jacobs run that went for his second straight touchdown for 18 yards in the fourth quarter.
The willingness for the Cowboys to tinker with their lineups on both sides of the ball in this game might be an overall positive, but the actual effectiveness of it when it comes to still asking players to do things beyond what they’re skills fit is a problem that didn’t go away in allowing 40 points.
Going forward, it might actually be even harder for Liufau to see the field, as his late-hit penalty in the fourth quarter turned a would be third-down attempt into a first down, and Josh Jacobs ripped off a 14-yard run on the very next play. Reddy Steward helped get the defense into another third and long situation with a tackle for loss, but Love found Doubs for his third touchdown working against Elam.
Right before this play, NBC analyst Cris Collinsworth pointed out that targeting backup safety Juanyeh Thomas might be where Love wanted to go, as Thomas was in for the injured Malik Hooker at this point. Thomas was actually the coverage upgrade over Hooker that many Cowboys fans have been calling for at times against the Packers though, and instead Love caught starting safety Donovan Wilson biting on an underneath route once again to fit the ball in to Doubs with Elam also not in position to defend it.
It wasn’t just the Cowboys defense playing through lineup changes on the fly in this game, as the offense that had to be nearly perfect in the second half and overtime had plenty to deal with as well. Most notably on the offensive line, Brock Hoffman remained in the starting lineup for Cooper Beebe at center, and T.J. Bass made his first start of the season at right guard over injured first-round pick Tyler Booker. Even Nate Thomas had to come in at both right and left tackle at different points in this game, actually playing on the left side against Parsons on the final drive of regulation where Prescott found Pickens working against a backup cornerback and scored the 28-yard touchdown that put the Cowboys ahead 37-34 late.
With all of these new faces up front, and the way Dallas had to navigate what parts of the game they could stick with their ground game and when it had to be all passing to keep up with the Packers, should go as one of the biggest positive takeaways from a game with no actual winner. Both Bass and Hoffman looked strong as run blockers, and the Cowboys did a good job helping them in pass protection with moving pocket throws or play-action. Holding up well enough to see Pickens prove himself as a more than capable WR1 without CeeDee Lamb is a win for the total depth of the Cowboys offensive line, which was nonexistent in a lost season just one year ago. For the amount of times the depth at wide receiver has also not given Prescott much of a chance to compete should a top dog like Lamb be sidelined, the offensive line and Pickens plus Jake Ferguson working in harmony to earn even a tie out of this game is a win for the development of this team moving forward. Jalen Tolbert’s 34-yard catch on a scramble drill in overtime also can’t be forgotten here.
A tie leaves the Cowboys in a bit of an awkward position when it comes to measuring how viable their playoff chances are going forward, coming on a day where the Eagles stayed undefeated and the Giants earned their first win against a previously undefeated Chargers team. Taking the ultimate goal of playoffs out of consideration for just a moment, in just one season the Cowboys have gone from offensive line and wide receiver being positions of little to no depth to strengths under Schottenheimer, who complemented what his team was working with at both spots against the Packers with a precise game plan. If this trend continues, it may be possible to call Schotty’s debut season a success regardless of where Dallas falls in the postseason picture.
Micah Parsons did officially record one sack in the box score when he chased down Prescott on a scramble near the line of scrimmage in overtime, but the Cowboys more than had a plan against their former defensive star, allowing the main story of the game to be taken off of the most obvious one and settled with the players that give them the best chance to win on any given Sunday on offense.
There were times the Cowboys deserved to win this game, and times they did not, and in the end nobody did in a long evening that ended anticlimactically.
