Reports of a dramatic turnaround for 2026 may have been, as it turns out, greatly exaggerated.
The Cowboys looked ill-prepared for the regular season in their Week 1 visit to MetLife Stadium. Not only did they show no noticeable improvement in any phase of the game during Sunday night's 28-20 loss, they looked like they may have regressed since last year's thoroughly disappointing finish. That Dallas both ended last season and started this one the same way- with an embarrassing road loss to the Giants- only hammers home the notion that perhaps, despite an offseason's worth of chatter about things being different in Big D... nothing much seemed to have changed at all.
The eagerly-anticipated "new-look" defense under first-time coordinator Christian
Parker allowed the Giants to rack up 29 first downs and nearly 400 yards of offense, with five of New York's seven drives covering 50 yards or more. The unit was almost entirely unable to get off the field, watching Big Blue convert a whopping nine of 11 third down attempts and letting Jaxson Dart & Co. retain possession for nearly 22 minutes of the second half.
That Cowboys run defense whose repair was such a point of emphasis in the offseason? They gave up an average of 4.5 yards over 37 carries as the Giants simply ran the ball at will all night. And the secondary- Parker's supposed strong suit- allowed Dart to compete almost 80% of his passes for three touchdowns en route to (by far) the highest passer rating of his young pro career.
Isaiah Likely was 8.8 yards away from the nearest defender when the ball arrived on this touchdown 🫣
— NFL+ (@NFLPlus) September 14, 2026
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Offensively, the Cowboys looked disturbingly rusty, with the star playmakers' lack of preseason snaps being painfully evident. Dak Prescott was out of sync with many his throws and held to under 200 yards, George Pickens had multiple drops in a near-total disappearing act, and Javonte Williams never rushed for more than eight yards on a single carry.
The offense was simply anemic to start the game, with the 9/11 pregame program and crowd of 83,000 raucous New Yorkers seeming to give the Giants an early boost. Dallas punted away both possessions of the first quarter. In the second frame, a 10-play touchdown drive appeared to right the ship, until Prescott's poorly-executed throwaway attempt was intercepted to end their next drive, and their follow-up to that was cut short by the halftime whistle.
In the second half, Dallas touched the ball just twice. And while both drives ended with touchdowns, the defense's utter inability to force the Giants off the field allowed John Harbaugh's crew to simply play keep away after the break.
Dak finds Javonte Williams out of the backfield for six!
— NFL (@NFL) September 14, 2026
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Though he had both of those second-half trips to the end zone, Williams's most-talked-about contribution will turn out to be his inexplicable taunting penalty on the last one, a move that cost the Cowboys a point on the scoreboard by forcing a PAT try from 48 yards. (It may have cost them two points and a ton of momentum; Cowboys head coach Brian Schottenheimer told reporters after the game the plan had been to try a two-point conversion prior to refs walking off 15 yards for that taunting penalty.)
But then Brandon Aubrey missed the long PAT anyway... and actually didn't look especially automatic with his other boots.
The Cowboys should have been expecting lots of penalties, as Carl Cheffers's crew is notoriously flag-happy. But many of their nine penalties (translating to 90 yards of surrendered field position) were eye-rollingly self-inflicted: DeMarvion Overshown's late hit well out of bounds, Jonathan Mingo's low block on a kick return, Donovan Ezeiruaku's face mask grab, and Williams's taunting call all stood out as particularly sloppy.
And just like that, questions will start to swirl around Cowboys Nation- about slow offensive starts, a defense that may not be fixed after all, the lack of discipline when it comes to penalties, and a Dallas team that is already in an 0-1 hole and looking at a very long week of self-doubt as they wonder whether this was just one bad night or the beginning of a season that's not at all what they had expected.
Todd is on X at @ToddBrock24f7. Also, follow Cowboys Wire on Facebook to join in on the conversation with fellow fans!
This article originally appeared on Cowboys Wire: Instant Analysis: Cowboys flat across all 3 phases in Week 1 loss to Giants
