The Giants are, in fact, a different team. They proved it Sunday night as they beat the Cowboys 28-20. A disappointing start to the Cowboys season.
The Cowboys sent out a team that was not ready to play football together. It seemed like the offense was constantly behind the chains, finding 2nd and 10 often. While the defense could not get off the field.
Watch my immediate post-game reaction ⬇️
I didn’t even rant about the 9 penalties the Cowboys had- at some point, you just expect Dallas to be a penalty-heavy team.
The Giants looked much better than the Cowboys all night, and the score was closer than it should have been. Diving deeper into some observations.
Someone Tackle Skattebo
18 carries for 81 yards doesn’t seem like absolute domination. That’s why you have to watch and see sometimes. Cam Skattebo looked like Earl Campbell out there, bouncing off tacklers. The Cowboys couldn’t stop him.
He was able to gain 1st downs late in the game, which sealed the deal. The Giants only needed three drives in the 2nd half to win the game. As for the backup Devin Singleterry, he was a beast in the receiving game and couldn’t be stopped either.
Well, for him, it seemed Dallas played a soft coverage and didn’t even try to stop him. Jaxson Dart ran all over the place too. Which is funny, that two of my keys to victory came to fruition, but it seemed only the Giants read them.
Dart had a sequence where he ran the ball 4 times in a row, 2 designed and 2 improvised. But it didn’t matter; there was no one in business to stop him.
We knew going into this game the Giants run a power-run scheme with heavy personnel, led by their fullback Patrick Ricard. They didn’t hide anything. They did exactly that, and ran all over Dallas.
Defense Can’t Get Off the Field
There were opportunities to get off the field. The Giants fumbled the ball 4 times, recovering 3. The only recovery Dallas had was a punch-out by Quinnen Williams, a high-effort play, recovered by Shavon Revel Jr. The Cowboys proceeded to throw a pick on the ensuing drive.
This led to the Giants finding a wide-open Isaiah Likely at the end of the half on a busted Cowboy coverage.
The Giants would then come out of halftime and have back-to-back scoring drives, 8 minutes and 12+ plays each. The Giants were 9/10 on third down; there were opportunities, but the Cowboys could…not…get…off…the…FIELD!
This is incredibly sad when you remember the Browns and Dolphins played football today.
Has the Offense Practiced Together?
While that may be slightly facetious, I don’t think it would be a crazy question if you did not follow the Cowboys training camp closely.
The start of the game put the Cowboys in a 3rd-and-long quickly. A gimmie slant to Pickens was called a few inches short of the 1st down by the replay, a brutal start. I was surprised the Cowboys surrendered immediately and punted.
This caused the Cowboys to play from behind quickly. But every time the offense came onto the field, they looked like they hadn’t played together. Dak was scrambling…a lot. He was constantly trying to roll out of the pocket, even when the protection held up.
It felt like he didn’t trust his line to block, and with Burns-Carter-Reese-Thibodeaux rushing…I don’t blame him. But Dak had risky throws all day with no rhythm or tempo. The offense was stagnant. If it weren’t for Javonte Williams bailing them out at times, the ball would have never moved.
The end-of-half interception was a play that secretly killed the Cowboys, as they failed to capitalize on getting points after a defensive turnover. The Dallas D came out and gave up a last-second TD.
The only first-half TD for Dallas was aided by two D-PI calls that got the ball to the one-yard line. As for the 2nd half, they started to shape up with two drives and two touchdowns, unfortunetly the defense never made it out of the locker room following halftime.
🚨 The Overreaction 🚨
Editor’s note: The following section contains no level-headed analysis. This is my chance to fire off a hot take I may regret by Tuesday.
The Cowboys are putting themselves behind in the division early. With fans excited to see the new additions and the newly built defense. To see if Christian Parker and friends can turn this thing around!
They were solely disappointed. Maybe it takes more than one offseason to rebuild a defense that couldn’t stop a division two college program last year. The young and smart DC everyone was excited for- struggled last night. This defense still does the same things they did last year.
I remember this quote from a few days ago… well, this defense needs to be held back.
The defense appears to have no pass rush, allows wide-open receivers all over the field, can’t stop a physical ground game, has communication problems, allows a lot of points, and commits multiple defensive offside penalties.
How did they only lose by 8?
Does this team do enough in the offseason when it comes to practice? Starters don’t play in preseason, and when they take the field in week one, it seems like Dallas all met each other that night and formed a team.
I don’t want to get worked up that week one decides our season but man, Dallas seems to never be ready to play week one. Even that first drive- how can you prepare all offseason and run a play where Jake Ferguson lines up at fullback as a lead blocker…a receiving TE!
The offense showed how bad it can be- they were not the 400 yards and 30 ppg that they were last year. They regressed in this one and showed that it could get really bad.
Dallas was outcoached.
Now they will head to week 2, carrying a lot of weight.
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