Normally, a 3-3 start to the season doesn’t have alarm bells sounding for an NFL team. Plenty could happen over the next 11 weeks.
The Dallas Cowboys are off to a 3-3 start and if an alarm sounding general quarters hasn’t been sounding since last week’s loss to Detroit, then it should be.
The biggest concern is the three losses.
Who Dallas has lost to and by how much.
The second concern is who the Cowboys have beaten in 2024. And, the Cleveland win aside, by how little those margins of victory have been.
The Cowboys’ offense has been lethargic early for the most part, with late surges against Baltimore and Pittsburgh.
Again, the win over the Browns to start the year is an outlier because Cleveland is just that bad.
Dallas’ defense hasn’t been much better. Injuries have crippled this unit, but even when mostly healthy they had issues.
This has to change, starting with this Sunday’s game in San Francisco.
Here’s what needs to happen.
Grind It Out
The other two Cowboys’ wins have been close. A five-point win over the Giants and a three-point victory over Pittsburgh.
In both games, the Cowboys put up 20 points while the defense managed to allow just two touchdowns over those eight quarters.
The key might be the running game. In the three wins, Dallas has had 80 yards or more rushing.
In the three losses, they have had 68, 53, and 51 yards on the ground.
If Dalvin Cook is healthy enough, the Cowboys need to bring him up and feed him the ball along with Rico Dowdle and Ezekiel Elliott.
Jerry Jones recently said the Cowboys were “saving” Elliott for later in the year. If they don’t start winning games against teams with winning records, there won’t be anything to save him for.
Start pounding the rock and the wins will come.
Also, stop ending drives with field goals.
That’s been an all-too common refrain for Dallas that hearkens back to the Jason Garrett days.
On the flip side, the defense needs to figure out how to stop the run. They’ve been gashed by Alvin Kamara, Derrick Henry, and David Montgomery.
Their next four opponents can also run the ball well.
Getting some players back from the injured list will help, but the interior of the defense needs to step up.
Anything less than a 5-5 record after Dallas squares off against the Houston Texans on Monday Night Football on Nov. 18th would pretty much seal the Cowboys’ fate.
Horns Down
The Texas Longhorns’ run as the No. 1 team in college football came to an inglorious end on Saturday night down in Austin.
The Georgia Bulldogs made Quinn Ewers and the Longhorns look like Dak Prescott and the Cowboys against the Lions.
Quinn Ewers
Source: https://insidethestar.com/what-dallas-has-to-do-over-the-next-4-weeks-to-save-its-season?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=insidethestar
