Dallas Cowboys

He may be unpopular outside of the dressing room, but we’ve been told all week how Tampa Bay Buccaneer head coach Raheem Morris has the support of the players. Words from Kellen Winslow before the game reinforced this idea, with the tight end adamant that he and his team would fight for their HC.

Either those were empty words or the Buccaneers are just not very good.

The Dallas Cowboys dominated from the get-go and it was only a lax third quarter that allowed the Bucs any sniff of getting back into the game–before the Dallas defense tightened-up and turned Josh Freeman into a check-down machine. The scoreline, if anything, flattered a limp and idealess Tampa Bay team who must be scratching their heads and wondering how this group of players earned victories over both the New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons. Read the rest of this entry »

The Buccaneers were very close to the playoffs last year, and–after seven straight losses–they will be watching from home again this time around. Their passing game just isn’t what it was last year, and their defense has been equally as bad.

Common sense says that it should be Dallas who wins this game, as they need to fight for their playoff spot, but they’ve been one of the hardest teams to predict, though they’ve typically pulled out victories when facing the weaker teams in the league. The loss of DeMarco Murray at running back certainly doesn’t help and every year we see a handful of games where the team playing for pride pulls it off, so this one’s far from in the bag for Dallas.

Can the Buccaneers be one of those teams that has a late-season upset to hurt someone else’s playoff chances? Here are three matchups that can help answer that question. Read the rest of this entry »

Exhausting. Fun. Unbelievable.

However you want to describe the New York Giants rollercoaster victory over the Dallas Cowboys, it doesn’t change what was a quite remarkable contest to cap off a good day of football. Full of big plays, blown coverages and lead changes, this was the kind of game that didn’t just live up to the billing; it surpassed it.

I’ll get to the most impressive aspects of the game in detail shortly. Looking past the individual performances for a second, this game was as big a statement as either could make – that it happened in all three phases made it all the more memorable. What if Tony Romo connects with Miles Austin when he was open deep with 2:25 to go in the fourth quarter? What if the Dallas defense doesn’t surrender two late touchdowns? What if Dan Bailey got his kick over the outstretched arm of Jason Pierre-Paul?

They didn’t, and instead the Giants defense got Eli Manning the ball back with 2:12 left and he was able to lead one of the great comebacks of the 2011. That seems as good a place to start as any as we look at the key performances of note on both sides here.

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Given some of the big games these two divisional rivals have played in the Tony Romo and Eli Manning era, it’s a bit surprising that the first 2011 meeting between the New York Giants and the Dallas Cowboys hasn’t come until Week 14. Thankfully, here we are and what a good bit of timing it turned out to be as the winner of this Sunday Night game will then be the front-runner to win the NFC East. Both teams are coming off close losses with the Cowboys losing in overtime to the Cardinals and the Giants off a tough home loss to the Packers.

Manning has had some fond memories in Dallas as he upset the Cowboys there in the 2007 Divisional Playoffs and won the first game in the Cowboys’ new stadium in 2009. Romo might have nightmares about this matchup though, as it was the Giants who ended his season in Week 7 of last year, also in primetime. Assuming both signal-callers can somehow survive their opponent’s fierce pass-rush, this should be an entertaining, high-scoring contest.

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OK, raise your hand if you saw this one coming. Dallas with a chance to take control of the NFC East blows the game to the Cardinals who were just grateful they didn’t have to start John Skelton anymore.

In a game that went down to the wire (actually beyond the wire as we hit over time), Jason Garrett showed some impressive coaching calamity as he successfully iced his own kicker, negating a kick Dan Bailey put straight down the middle with a late timeout only to see him shank his next try.

Arizona got the ball in overtime and worked their way to midfield before a moment of magic sealed the win with a touchdown. So how did it go down?

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A long week for the Dallas Cowboys followed by a trip to the desert to face an Arizona Cardinals team that isn’t exactly setting the league alight. With their NFC East competition falling over themselves to hand the division to them, things are looking rosy for the Cowboys. The question for Dallas now becomes are they just going to take advantage of a poor year from their NFC East mates to just claim the division, stumbling along with their rivals, or can they make something more of this season?

For the Cardinals, this season was rapidly turned into irrelevance by a string of games in which they couldn’t finish while their division rivals in San Francisco romped away with the NFC West. For now, this season is about damage limitation, playing the role of spoiler and trying to get some longer term answers as to what they have at the quarterback and running back positions and how they shape their offense moving forward. The defense is showing signs of life under new defensive coordinator Ray Horton but this has merely been another rudderless season on offense as the Cardinals still struggle to find an identity long after the departure of Kurt Warner. Read the rest of this entry »

Another Thanksgiving, another Cowboys victory. For the fifth time in the last six years the Cowboys’ celebrated Thanksgiving with a victory that, in terms of performance, was eerily reminiscent of late season games in seasons past – even if the result didn’t match. The Cowboys can, to an extent, count themselves fortunate to have walked away from this game with the win. The Dolphins had the better of the game and the measure of the Cowboys but some costly errors lost it for them.

In previous seasons’ games like this, where they are on the short end of the stick in terms of performance, the Cowboys have found themselves on the short end of the stick on the scoreboard as well. Not so in this game as they halted the Dolphins’ winning streak at three thanks in large part to some crucial mistakes by the Dolphins and some crucial drives of their own. Read the rest of this entry »

While the Dolphins and Cowboys only play each other every few years, they have a rich Thanksgiving history. In 1973 they were two of the best teams in the NFL and their game that season resulted in a Dolphins 14-7 victory. Troy Aikman won once and lost once in this matchup, and most recently in 2003, the Dolphins dominated in a 40-21 victory although it was Dallas that ended up in the playoffs.

Now in their fifth Thanksgiving matchup, only one team goes into it with a winning record. While Dallas has their sights set on passing the Giants in the division and on a playoff run, Miami is just looking to win for pride. While you might not think pride is good enough, they have dominated their last three opponents. Now we’ll see if Miami is a legitimately good team that has a very long shot at the playoffs, or if they’ve just been feasting on weaker opponents. Read the rest of this entry »

These ancient NFC East rivals usually play close, competitive games no matter their records and this latest battle was no different. The 5-4 Dallas Cowboys came into this game with a revitalized rushing attack in the form of rookie DeMarco Murray having laid a 44-7 beatdown on the Buffalo Bills, who were a contender for at least the first half of the season.

The 3-6 Washington Redskins were coming off their fifth straight loss at the hands of a Miami Dolphins squad that had only won once. Clearly, the Cowboys were the favorites here yet the Redskins showed plenty of fight, taking this contest into overtime. Two missed field goals and some blown coverages, however, led to the Redskins coming away with a sixth consecutive loss after their promising 3-1 start. Read the rest of this entry »

This ancient NFC East rivalry continues this week at FedEx field with the Dallas Cowboys looking capable of winning the division and the Washington Redskins once again the bottom-dweller. While the Cowboy’s 5-4 record makes it seem likely that they’ll beat the 3-6 Redskins, these two squads play each other tough more often than not, so an opposite result wouldn’t be too surprising.

This game is actually a rematch of the close 18-16 Cowboys win over the Redskins in Week 3 on Monday Night Football. In that contest, QB Tony Romo was playing just a week after suffering a rib injury and, while unable to get in the end zone, was able to lead six field-goal drives which proved to be just enough to give their arch rivals their first loss of the season. Rex Grossman had been solid for Washington up to that point despite having turnovers in the first two games, but two more giveaways in that one proved too costly. The Redskins have only won once since, and that was against the struggling St. Louis Rams.

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