Brett's Cowboys Corner

Some late game heroics from Rayne Dakota Prescott, first jumping on the Rico Dowdle fumble, he then finds Jalen Tolbert on 4th down for the go ahead score.

The Cowboys go to Pittsburgh and fight for a victory, 20-17, Cowboys improve their record to 3-2 and are now undefeated on the road.

How should we feel after this win?

First, nothing more shows how abused of a fan base we have, than when we have to question if this is a win we should enjoy. Winning is good! When they tally them up at the end of the season, last second touchdowns and 40 point blowouts count all in the same.

Dak and the Offense Prevailed in the End

Going into the final 5 minutes of the game, Dak just threw a deep ball interception, trying to take advantage of a single high safety which led to the go-ahead Pittsburgh touchdown, 17-13. Needing a touchdown to win the offense took the field, in that moment it was understood, that if the offense failed here they spent the entire game digging themselves into a hole with mistakes and lost this game. With a few big runs from Rico Dowdle and Dak conducting the offense, he drove the ball 70 yards downfield yard by yard, and got the ball to the one-yard mark, 2nd and goal. This is where I am yelling at my TV to sneak the ball.

And look how open that sneak was…the Cowboys hand it to Dowdle who made a lot of big plays and has the only touchdown at this point. He tries to dive over the line and fumbles the ball, the ball bounces back toward the QB and Dak does his first part of saving the day, by jumping on the fumble.

On 3rd down Dak fires the ball into the back of the endzone to Tolbert and misses him low. Way low.

After an enternity of timeouts, The Cowboys have 4th and goal and one shot to win the game. Dak stays calm in the pocket and goes back to the young guy, Tolbert for the game. But take a look 1.5 seconds into this play.

Where is this ball going to go? You have Ferguson on the ground after a chip block on TJ Watt, who is about to push past Steele for a sack, but Steele holds on. TJ Bass makes one of the most crucial blocks by putting the edge on the ground to clear the line of sight for Dak. Take a look at Tolbert, three defenders, and avoiding collision with Lamb.

Dak stays calm in the pocket and fire the ball to the pylon, on the money to Tolbert. Game.

There was a lot of discussion of which receiver would step up to the abscense of Brandin Cooks, I think Tolbert was the needed answer. A higher draft pick than others, was already the 3rd receiver. He needed to step up for himself and to show the organization the value behind him. He did just that.

Jalen Tolbert set career highs in targets (10), receptions (7), and receiving yards (87), including the game-winning 4-yard touchdown with 26 seconds left in regulation.

Offensive Play Calling was Better

If we spend time criticizing uncreative play calls from McCarthy, when they get creative it is only fair to praise them. From the first offensive drive, the Cowboys utilized motion and had a slot motion to the outside for a wheel route that they went to a few times and it looked very fun!

Here is my best visual. There were many other motions and creative plays like Turpin motioning into the back field and kind of doing a sprint outside for a screen, which is called an orbit screen…chefs kiss.

The offense felt faster overall but it still felt like we were fighting for every yard, I think this has more to do with the fact, this offense is brand new, we didn’t do this the first four weeks. This is week 1 in a sense.

It would be a disservice to leave out a main reason the offense felt faster, Rico Dowdle stepped up and had one his most productive days. He was hitting gaps quickly and broke a few long runs, 10+ yards which the Cowboys have not had yet. Rico had 114 yards from scrimmage and made a tough catch for the score.

The highest graded offensive players per PFF:

• Zack Martin
• Jalen Tolbert
• Kavontae Turpin
• Dak Prescott
• Rico Dowdle

Factors against Dallas

The main story happened before kickoff, after torrential down pour and thunderstorms kickoff was delayed for an hour and a half. Players sitting in the locker rooms trying to stay loose during that time. When it came time to play, the team prepared by switching to 7-stud cleats to help with the wet surface.

From the team, players agreed that the playing surface overall was a non-factor and it was well maintained by Pittsburgh’s grounds crew.

The Cowboys came into this game with an injury bug, missing two starting defensive ends and then losing Marshawn Kneeland on the 4th defensive snap. Not to mention their cornerback room missed Caelen Carson again and featured an injured Trevon Diggs. Dallas powered through the injuries and kept the ‘next man up’ mentality and saw relied on the help from the back of their depth charts or even guys who were just called up from the practice squad.

Some Problems Created by Yourself

The defensive made stops and played well a majority of the game. The Cowboys offense failed to capitalize until the very end. Three redzone turnovers, this will lose you any game 9 times out of 10. Luckily for the offense, the Cowboys defense kept getting stops and forced Justin Fields to be a playmaker with his arm…which is always a positive for the other team.

This is the sack fumble, dak pulls the ball back in and TJ Watt gets his 100th career sack here. This play took a bit too long to develop. I feel like the Cowboys should of been more prepared that these two edges, TJ Watt and Nick Herbig were going to be problems all night and there was a need for mindfulness of getting the ball out quick.

This is from the the goal line interception. This entire play was a miscommunication and kind of forced. First Dak was trying to get a quick snap because the Steelers made a late sub, #57 Adams was running onto the field and was offsides. Dak wanted the snap to get a free play, Beebe didn’t get the ball snapped in time and the play started, and Dak kind of forces into the corner. Lamb overruns the ball, but even if he was supposed to break on a come back, the nickel corner was waiting underneath.

The other turnover in the redzone was from the blocked fieldgoal, which doesn’t technically count on the stat sheet but its still losing an opportunity to get points close to the endzone and loss of the ball. Having those three means your final drive only needed a field goal to win.

Your offensive tackles were a problem early. Dak had to get the ball out quick, the edges we pushing around Guyton and Steele early. This created a lot of problems from the offense and led to some of the mistakes.

Defense Did Exactly What Was Needed

There is not much need to deep dive into the defense, they replicated what they did last week. Less questions. The amazing feat was overcoming all the injuries, Mike Zimmer had his defense prepared this week. This would of been a stomping if Parsons and DLaw were availble.

The defensive line dominated a poor blocking offensive line. The Steelers made an effort to take Osa Odighizuwa out of the game in their Week 5 matchup, double-teaming him on 12 of his 24 pass rushes. Osa still walked away with a pressure and a sack.

With the double team, the other guys stepped up, Linval Joseph played a great game, the force fumble after running over the guard was memorable.

Linebackers stayed clean and kept Najee Harris under complete control, without letting Fields dominate with his legs either. 14 for 42 yards for Harris, the Steelers kept running the ball but it was an overall unproductive run game.

Jourdan Lewis continues to be an underrated member of the defense. The five highest graded defenders from PFF:

• Linval Joseph
• Jourdan Lewis
• Chauncy Golston
• Marist Liufau
• Malik Hooker

What Does it All Mean?

So what should we take away from this hard fought win? A win is a win.

But there are also some discussions that will need to be raised. Cooks was out this game, we all know he is dealing with a knee injury. But I think the offense looked faster, and more smooth without Cooks, primarily when they played Turpin more. The offense went away from its safety valves and tried different things, and they were beneficial with Turpin on the field.

Guyton went down with a knee injury, and I was very surprised when the team decided to move Tyler Smith to tackle and bring in TJ Bass. The scariest part of that, the left side of the offensive line improved when that change was made. You surely can’t move away from your first round pick this early. But if your goal is to win games…your best five linemen may leave Guyton out.

Overall, this is a good win. A tough win builds strength among players, and they were vocal about this in their post game availability. This builds momentum and keeps team morale up. Tough and gritty win, but this can lead nicely into playing a tough opponent next week, Detroit Lions who are coming off a bye. Also you have to play in a very tough environment…at least that’s what it seems like this year…playing at home, AT&T Stadium.