Dallas City News

A year ago, the Cowboys did something that no other team in the NFL accomplished: they were undefeated at home in the regular season. Eight games played in Dallas and all of them were won. The next best team at home, though, was the Cleveland Browns; they went 8-1 in FirstEnergy Stadium, winning just as many home games as the Cowboys but playing one extra and losing it.

While the Cowboys were unbeatable at home, they were less bulletproof on the road. Their 4-5 record away from home ranked right in the middle of the NFL, with their four road wins coming against teams that had a combined 17-51 record; three of those four teams fired their head coach as well.

Throw in the fact that the Cowboys struggled to stop the run last year and were starting two rookies on their offensive line, and it’s easy to see why the Browns – who love to run the ball and have the reigning Defensive Player of the Year in Myles Garrett – came into this game as the favorites, albeit by a slim margin.

Not only did the Cowboys win the game, but they demolished the Browns in their own home. Garrett got a sack, but otherwise the pass rush was bottled up, with only five pressures in the game and just two of them given up by the two rookies. Dak Prescott didn’t have a spectacular day, completing 59% of his passes for 179 yards, but he played clean football against a defense that rarely let quarterbacks do that a year ago. And the Browns were one of just four teams to be held under 60 rushing yards (not counting quarterback scrambles) in Week 1.

To say that everything went perfectly for the Cowboys would be an understatement. This was a game they were supposed to lose, or at the very least come away with a narrow win. Instead, they showed up ready to dominate in all three phases of the game. The defense, in their first game under Mike Zimmer, looked even better than they did under Dan Quinn. Special teams was very special, with Brandon Aubrey having a perfect game and KaVontae Turpin taking a punt to the house.

The closest thing to a real negative in this game was the fact that Aubrey was robbed of his 66-yard field goal, which the kicker drilled with ease in a stadium known for its windy conditions. Of course, it didn’t count due to a delay of game penalty, which made both Mike McCarthy and John Fassel irate with the officials. On Monday, Fassel explained his reason for directing his anger at the referees:

Fassel blamed the referees on multiple counts. He said they were tardy in swapping the quarterback ball off of the field and replacing it with the K-Ball, the one kickers and punters use when special teams is on the field. Long snapper Trent Sieg was also delayed in snapping the ball [because] Cleveland made a late defensive substitution.

“So by the time we got over the ball and snapped it, we were one second late,” Fassel said. “So that was my observation of it. Had a conversation with the official before halftime and after halftime, especially once I talked to Trent that he was told to hold because of a defensive substitution, supposedly happened, and that’s what cost us that second. So it’s too bad.”

McCarthy believed that the play clock would be reset because of the delay in getting the correct ball on the field, but that didn’t happen. It cost Aubrey the opportunity to tie Justin Tucker’s record for the longest field goal made, in addition to costing the Cowboys three more points. But if that was the biggest negative to come out of this game, the Cowboys will surely take it.

Otherwise, it’s hard to find nits to pick in this one. The offense could have been more explosive, but it was clear that McCarthy – in his second year calling the plays in Dallas – was calling the game differently than he normally would to mitigate the pass rush and aid his rookie linemen.

Even without the fireworks we became accustomed to last year from this offense, McCarthy had his players ready for this game. Coming into Cleveland and escaping with a win was no easy task last year, but the Cowboys did it without even breaking a sweat. That’s a welcome sight for a team that often struggled to get going against better teams last year; and while there’s no guarantee the Browns will be as good as they were last year, when they made the playoffs, this game can at least provide a meaningful confidence boost as the Cowboys head home to take on the Saints.