Dallas Cowboys prevent 0-2 start with wild rally, improbable onside kick recovery
How big was the Dallas Cowboys’ last-second win Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons?
If history is any judge, an 0-2 start would have been a massive blow to their playoff chances.
Since 2007, only 12 of the 100 teams that started 0-2 made the playoffs. The last to do it were the 2018 Seattle Seahawks and Houston Texans. The Seahawks finished 10-6 and lost the wild card playoff against the Cowboys at AT&T Stadium. The Texans finished 11-5 and won the AFC South, but lost the wild card to the Indianapolis Colts.
The Cowboys have missed the playoffs the last three times they started 0-2 (in 2000, 2001 and 2010). The 1993 Cowboys, of course, rebounded to win their second consecutive Super Bowl.
On Sunday, the Cowboys escaped with a 40-39 win at AT&T Stadium after rallying to score 16 points in the final five minutes, including a shocking onside kick recovery with 1:49 remaining. It set up Greg Zuerlein’s 46-yard game-winning field goal as time expired.
The game-winning kick was set up by two quick Cowboys touchdowns in the fourth quarter. The first came on a 10-yard pass to Dalton Schultz from Dak Prescott with 4:57 remaining. The second came on Prescott’s 1-yard run with 1:49 left.
On the ensuing kickoff, Zuerlein squibbed his kick to the left side of the field. Several Falcons players in the area seemed to freeze as the ball approached the necessary 10 yards before the Cowboys could recover. Cornerback C.J. Goodwin pounced on it to set up Dallas at its 46.
“I have never used it before in a game. But we practiced it early in the year just in case because you have to have something,” Zuerlein said of his squib kick, which he used to practice when he was with the Rams. “It worked for us today.”
The Cowboys moved 26 yards before Zuerlein booted the winning field goal with no time left on the clock.
The wild finish overshadowed an ugly start for the Cowboys. Dallas fumbled four times and lost three in the first quarter and trailed the Falcons by 20-0 at the end of the first quarter and 29-10 at the half.
“I thought the whole football team, with Dak in the lead there, showed great resiliency,” said Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy, who is now 5-0 all-time at AT&T Stadium, including a Super Bowl win in 2011. “There were a bunch of big time plays. The ability to overcome all the adverse situations and take it all the way down to the wire. It was great clock management by Dak at the end and Greg nailed it for the victory. We spent a lot of time [practicing] on the final segments of the game and our guys did a great job of executing it here in the clutch.”
This story was originally published September 20, 2020 at 4:54 PM.
