How a failed play last week led to the Cowboys’ longest touchdown of the season
In the Dallas Cowboys’ Christmas Day win over the Washington Commanders, the offense was put in a familiar situation in the second quarter.
Up 14-3 and pinned deep in their own territory after a strong punt from the Commanders’ Tress Way, the Cowboys were looking to put together a long scoring drive to take the air out of Northwest Stadium. However, an incomplete pass from quarterback Dak Prescott and a 1-yard loss set the offense back even farther for a third-and-11 from its own 14-yard line.
The Cowboys deployed top two receivers CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens on the outside, while speedster KaVontae Turpin was put in the slot. Expecting a disguised form of Cover 2 (technically called Tricky 2) where the opposing defense shows like they have one safety deep just to roll the second safety back after the snap, the Cowboys’ plan was to take advantage of that by having Turpin run right by the rolling safety.
“I think everybody knows my speed,” Turpin said. “When they see me flying down the middle and nobody is touching me, they know it’s over with by the time Dak throws the ball. They know it’s over with.”
Turpin streaked across the middle of the field right by the rolling safety, and Prescott put it on his chest around the 50-yard line. From there, Turpin, with his world-class speed, ran untouched to the end zone for the Cowboys’ longest play all season.
“They went to what we call Tricky 2, where they’re trying to ask guys that probably aren’t used to running with guys that run 4.2 [40-yard dash time like Turpin] down the middle of field,” head coach Brian Schottenheimer said. “And we’ve repped that quite a bit. We’ve talked about that quite a bit.”
In fact, they’ve repped it so much that you only have to go back to last week’s loss to the Los Angeles Chargers to see where the Cowboys tried to run the same concept. Facing another third-and-long situation with roughly seven minutes left in the game, the Chargers’ defense ran a form of Tricky 2 to try and disguise the rolling safety, Derwin James. Turpin got a bad start and couldn’t find the hole and instead pulled up early. Prescott threw the ball, and it fell incomplete 10 yards away from Turpin.
“Similar type of deal, cover two, the difference was Derwin [James] kind of genuinely stays on top of the safety,” Schottenheimer said. “And [Turpin] just felt like he couldn’t get there. We give those guys a chance to kind of read it. And when they can certainly go, sometimes they go. When they can’t, they have other responses that they can do, but it’s exactly the same type of thing. Another third-and-long call, expecting Tricky 2. I mean, that’s really cool, exactly a similar situation.”
That play ended the drive and, for all intents and purposes, ended a comeback attempt for the Cowboys in Week 16. One week later, it helped give Dallas a three-possession lead that the team would not relinquish.
“Great play-calling knowing that they’re going to a Cover 2 or some kind of Tricky 2,” Prescott said. “The key to that one was they actually jumped offsides, and we pulled the ball faster. It ended up turning into the same play: Three guys just going vertical. I think with the jump offsides, and those guys trying to panic and get back, Turpin did a good job of getting over the top and I saw it. With a guy like that, you just want to put it down the middle and give him a chance, and he went and did the rest.”
“That’s what you love about him in the slot,” Schottenheimer said. “Because if they do want to try to double the outside studs, [Turpin] could hurt you in so many ways. I knew he wasn’t getting caught, by the way. The way he caught it, it was like bye, bye. It was like Forrest Gump, and it was like, yeah, they aren’t catching him.”
This story was originally published December 26, 2025 at 12:35 PM.
