Five takeaways from Cowboys’ huge comeback win over Eagles
In one of the more entertaining games of the season, the Dallas Cowboys overcame a 21-point first-half deficit and scored 24 unanswered points on their way to a huge 24-21 win over the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday at AT&T Stadium. It is tied for the largest comeback win in franchise history.
In a game in which he set the franchise’s all-time passing yards mark, Dak Prescott threw for 354 yards and accounted for three touchdowns in the win. George Pickens had yet another huge game with nine receptions for 146 yards and a touchdown.
Here are the five biggest takeaways from a game that certainly had its ups and downs:
Comeback Cowboys overcome awful start
In what was easily the Cowboys’ worst start all season, somehow they were able to dig out of an early 21-0 hole to earn one of their more improbable victories.
When the team made its first comments after the death of Marshawn Kneeland earlier this month, the players and coaches emphasized how much they wanted to honor him with the intense and passionate style of play that he embodied.
On a day when they honored him pregame in their first home game since the tragedy, the Cowboys did just that. After facing one of their biggest deficits of the season, the Cowboys battled back with a performance their fallen teammate would have been proud of in front of his family watching in a suite overhead.
“It means a lot,” defensive end Donovan Ezeiruaku said. “Obviously, we played with a heavy heart today back home. We had our moment of silence and played that tribute to our brother, Marshawn. It was tough at first, but we knew we had a job to do, and we knew we wanted to play like him and go get this win for him.”
The defense wins its first game
It wasn’t pretty in the beginning. Shoot, that could go for both sides of the ball.
But when the Cowboys (5-5-1) needed a handful of offensive drives to dig out of a big hole, the defense rattled off eight consecutive drives without giving up points, its longest stretch all season.
“I credit it to the whole team,” rookie cornerback Shavon Revel Jr. said. “The talk has always been that the defense is a problem. I’m not saying we did that because people say that, we’re doing it for each other. We know what we can do, and we’ve seen it at practice. We saw it in the game. The job ain’t finished, and that’s what we preached today.”
After taking rightful criticism for the first half of the season for its horrid play in both pass and run defense, the unit has responded with back-to-back weeks of encouraging play behind its new additions such as Quinnen Williams (more on him later), Logan Wilson, DeMarvion Overshown and more.
The offense has won four games this year, but consider this a win for defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus’ group.
“It starts with our defense,” Prescott said. “They were the reason we were able to come back in this game, have a chance to win it. We’ve got to stop shooting ourselves in the foot, and this game could have been completely different.”
Unforced errors almost dig an insurmountable hole
When the Eagles (8-3) jumped out to a quick 21-0 lead, there was still a lot of time for the Cowboys to put drives together and play at their normal pace with still 10 minutes to go in the first half. Inside the 1-yard line with a golden opportunity to punch it in, a Tyler Guyton false start moved Dallas back five yards before Prescott left a pass short to Lamb that was picked off in the end zone by Eagles safety Reed Blankenship.
“Whether it’s me scrambling out on the 1, maybe go jump and get in the end zone again,” Prescott said. “Who knows, but we have to convert when we have four opportunities [on the goal line]. We have too many elite players to stall like that.”
It was one of many unforced errors in this game. Earlier, a roughing the punter penalty — granted, it should not have been called, as the replay showed Ryan Flournoy tipped the ball, making the contact legal, but it was not challenged — kept an Eagles scoring drive going. A later play on the same drive saw a third-down stop get eradicated because of a Jadaveon Clowney offside call.
On the ensuing offensive drive, KaVontae Turpin coughed up the football on a designed run out of the backfield that saw him stumble over himself and hand the ball to the Eagles.
When a comeback attempt needs every inch of help it can get, unforced errors like those often make the difference in a tally in the win or loss column. Dallas is lucky that the miscues did not cost the team on the way to an improbable win.
CeeDee Lamb is officially struggling
Well, I can confirm that wide receiver CeeDee Lamb has been on the field for the Cowboys over the past few games, but where is his production? After a Week 1 disaster that saw him drop a career-high four passes in the loss in Philadelphia, Lamb followed it up with two drops Sunday and just four receptions on 11 targets.
The flash is still there at times. See the 48-yard reception in the third quarter that set up the team’s second touchdown. But in comparison to the reliable target he’s been over the course of his career, Lamb has been a liability when targeted at times over the past few weeks.
In the past five games, Lamb has been targeted 48 times and has hauled in just 28 receptions. His dwindling completion percentage is becoming a thorn in the offense’s side.
Quinnen Williams’ impact is real
After the defense gave up 21 points in a hurry to open the game, the unit saw a huge uptick in improvement as defensive tackle Quinnen Williams started to get home on his pressures.
The Cowboys paid a hefty price to acquire one of the league’s best defensive tackles, and they’ve seen his impact through just two games. While he did not get home for a sack Sunday, the dedication by the Eagles’ offensive line to double-teaming No. 92 freed up other pass rushers to make life difficult on Jalen Hurts.
With a six-game stretch down the rest of the season that the Cowboys desperately need to win at least five in, where you find winning football might be where you find Quinnen Williams.
This story was originally published November 23, 2025 at 6:51 PM.
