McCarthy reacts to Cowboys at 1-2: ‘By no means are we a clean football team right now’
Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy is now 1-2 after his team lost 38-31 to the Seattle Seahawks Sunday at CenturyLink Field.
McCarthy responded to questions about the secondary, the slowing down Russell Wilson, not covering Tyler Lockett, special teams miscues, and the Cowboys’ final possession with a chance to tie or win the game.
He touched on these topics and more with reporters after the game. Here’s an edited transcript provided Cowboys public relations:
McCarthy’s opening statement
Difficult loss here today. Obviously, a lot went on during the course of the game. Our guys battled as they always do. Special teams, offense and defense I’ll think in big picture, I’ll look at as I do the overall game. Their big plays resulted in more points than ours. Turnover ratio, we had a lot of production, but we’ve got to do a better job in that area. I thought that our guys did a lot defensively getting off the field, but the ability to keep the quarterback in the pocket and keep him there at times was a challenge. So, obviously we had a chance to go down there and tie it and win at the end, but we just didn’t get that part done.
McCarthy on the last drive when they had a chance to tie it and what didn’t work offensively
We were playing in pure zone coverage and really just trying to get it done with the pass rush. Obviously in the beginning of the route we were able to get down there cleanly. Protection wise, Dak had to move his feet on a couple of plays there, and I thought he made a tremendous play staying on his feet on the last play to get the bounce run into the end zone. Execution, particularly playing long field that’s tough, we had three timeouts and we’ll be better next time for it.
On Russell Wilson and the issues he has getting out of the pocket and did McCarthy design to do a bunch rush and keep him in from behind a little bit for most of the game
That was part of it. Part of it was self-scout. I felt it was something we could do more of. I thought for the most part we did a great job keeping him in the pocket. I thought the challenge for second reaction rush was a bit challenging the way the play was expanded and the way they were able to hold on to us and extend those plays even when we did a great job keeping him in the pocket. I thought it was a good plan.
On the turnover at the end of the first half and to start the third quarter
Going into the half you are looking for a score coming in and a score coming off is always a huge momentum. Opportunities as a football team, that’s part of the equation and why we defer in a coin toss, so to me everybody is on for something and we will always start and stop with the capability to take care of the football and take it away and we haven’t gotten that done in the last two weeks. We need to change that quickly or we are going to be in these battles each week. It’s difficult to overcome turnovers. I would say the one for the half the route was undercut and the one to start the half it looked like we had protection to stay there.
McCarthy’s thoughts on what they did defensively when they scored on the final possession when they were at 3rd and 3
They did a good job on the fourth down, they extended the play, that was good execution on their part and they hit the backside on the post and that was a big play for the touchdown and I thought we did a poor job on the three point play on the quarterback keep. They made more key plays than we did. I think when you look at the numbers, I haven’t seen them yet, we had a lot of production, but the key plays to the game, you’ve got to give those guys credit.
How do you clean up the defensive coverage, specifically the ones around Tyler Lockett when he was wide open?
“We’ll get on the plane watch tape, we’ll correct it and when we get back tomorrow morning that Monday phase where we get the players to the weight room and obviously sit down and correct every play as coaches and players.”
Did Seattle take advantage of the safeties or were the guys not covering long enough outside?
Anytime you play your people get on a post run wide open. That’s what Monday’s are for. We’ll take a hard look at it.
McCarthy assesses the special teams performance
A three play period makes it hard to say it was a good day. The fact that it was a big play in the game, obviously gave them momentum. We came out too strong and obviously a nine point swing right there. We’ve got to do a better job. I think like anything in the game of football you need a return on investment on what you emphasize. We’ve spent a tremendous amount of time handling the football and we need to do a much better job in that area.
How did the offensive line do despite the injuries and guys playing in different spots?
I think we’re hanging in there. I think the fact you have three different lineups in the course of the game, you see the production we are able to have on offense, but by no means are we a clean football team right now. We need to execute better. We have a number of injuries and we’re working through that. Our rhythm and timing is not quite where we want it to be, and we’ll continue to work on getting that done.
