Yes, the Dallas Cowboys came up short in Week 1. Here’s why that might not be all bad
A season ago, after leading the Dallas Cowboys to a 3-0 start with three straight sizzling performances, quarterback Dak Prescott pressed the pause button on what team owner Jerry Jones called an “imminent” contract extension.
Prescott felt he played his way into more money and wanted the Cowboys to increase their offer.
The resulting contract impasse and months of silence led to Prescott playing the 2020 season on the one-year franchise tag of $31.4 million and ensured a season of contract narratives and weekly evaluations even though the Cowboys and the quarterback have expressed confidence that a deal will get done in 2021.
But after Game 1 of 2020, a 20-17 loss to the Los Angeles Rams, Prescott is glad to have 15 more games for the Cowboys to assess.
On paper, Prescott was good, even very good at times, but he didn’t prove to be a franchise-player difference maker. He completed 25 of 39 passes for 266 yards and had one touchdown while connecting to seven different receivers.
But he only led the Cowboys to a field goal in the second half after completing 15 of 18 passing for 187 yards and touchdown in guiding the team to a 14-13 halftime lead.
Prescott was 3 of 8 for 34 yards in the third quarter and 7 of 13 for 40 yards in the fourth when the Cowboys twice failed to tied the game or take the lead.
“I’ll have to go back and look at it on tape and be hard on myself and make sure that that I’m finding things that were good,” Prescott said. “But also looking at all the things that I can get better on, I can improve and make sure I lead this offense and this team to win. I judge myself off of wins, so it was obviously a loss and not a performance I’m going to proud of. Especially as I said, not capitalizing on that two-minute drive in being able to tie the game up or win the game.”
Coach Mike McCarthy played a key role in Prescott’s performance and the Cowboys loss with a questionable decision to shun a game-tying field goal for a failed try on 4th-and-3 from the Rams’ 11-yard line with 11:46 left in the game.
The first-year Cowboys coach was generally positive in what he saw from his quarterback in the opener.
“I like the way Dak played,” McCarthy said. “I like the whole operation. [Offensive coordinator] Kellen [Moore] called a decisive football game. Communication for the first time out there as a staff you know being proactive with the adjustments. I thought Dak commanded those adjustments that he made and played with urgency and with toughness. He made some plays with his feet. I thought he did some really great things.”
The Cowboys did some great things with Prescott and Moore, but McCarthy was hired to replaced the-fired Jason Garrett because a lack of efficiency at crucial times and inability to win close games. The problems remained the same against the Rams as the Cowboys’ considerable offense talents posted just 17 points and the team fell to 1-9 in games decided by three points or less going back to the start of last season.
The biggest thing that bogged down the offense was the unit’s inability to convert on third down. The Cowboys were 3 for 12 on third down against the Rams, and just 1 for 8 on such conversions in the second half.
And Prescott was downright awful on third down. He completed one of seven passes and he was sacked once. That 14.3% completion rate on 3rd down was the worst in any game of Prescott’s career with a minimum of five attempts.
“We have to be better as an offensive unit on third down,” running back Ezekiel Elliott said. “You know, kind of converting those third downs and keeping the ball moving, and when we get in the red zone scoring touchdowns. It has got to be mandatory that when we get in the red zone we score touchdowns.”
Said McCarthy: “We were not productive enough on the third downs. I thought the offense generated a lot of first downs and the ball distribution was far as the targets were, were closer than we needed to get to. Third down and point production were what we were looking for offensively.”
It’s a quite different scene than a year ago when the Cowboys started the season 3-0 for the first time since 2008 and scored at least 31 points in each game. However, the team went 5-8 the rest of the way, finished the season at 8-8 and missed the playoffs.
If there’s good news out there it’s this: The last three times the Cowboys made playoffs — 2014, 2016 and 2018— they lost the season opener. Prescott was the quarterback in 2016 and 2018 so he knows how to rally from a slow start.
“For the expectations we put on ourselves, we didn’t make plays,” Prescott said. “We didn’t execute. We didn’t execute to the standards that we have for ourselves. But it’s Game 1 and there’s a lot of football left. I know this is a talented team and we’re going to continue to work hard and just get better. We’re gonna make sure that we improve from this game. Like I said, we’ll never be satisfied with this result.”
Prescott and the Cowboys get a chance to rebound in next Sunday’s home opener against the Atlanta Falcons (0-1) at AT&T Stadium.
This story was originally published September 14, 2020 at 6:52 PM.
