Dallas City News

The Cowboys suffered what might have been their ugliest loss of the season on Sunday, and that’s saying a lot. Their 34-6 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles pretty much put the final nail in the coffin of their 2024 season. Unlike a few other games this season, the Cowboys defense kept them in a position to compete heading into halftime. Unfortunately, the offense was abysmal with QB Cooper Rush under center.

Rush entered the game with a 5-1 record as a starter. In the past, he had proven himself as a reliable backup to Prescott when they needed him most. Unlike previous showings, there was nothing positive about Rush’s performance against the Eagles defense. If his two fumbles weren’t bad enough, he finished the game with an astonishingly-low 45 passing yards. No matter your situation, only 45 passing yards as an NFL quarterback is inexcusable. He simply couldn’t find any momentum throughout the game, missing several passes and making key mistakes. It didn’t get much better when his backup Trey Lance entered the game in the fourth quarter.

While this game didn’t provide much for Cowboys fans, it did confirm one thing: the Dallas Cowboys are a much better football team with Dak Prescott on the field. It would have been interesting to see what this game could have looked like with Prescott under center. Micah Parsons and DeMarvion Overshown provided time for the offense to make it a game. It’s safe to assume the team wouldn’t have failed to reach the end zone all game like they did, and that it overall would have been a much more competitive game.

The criticisms towards the lack of playoff success with Prescott as the team’s quarterback over his career is completely justifiable. That is the ultimate determinant in the NFL. But we now can see how much he was doing to just carry the Cowboys along on offense this season, because the first game without Prescott and even CeeDee Lamb was shut down. The team just needs to provide him a competitive roster next year.