Hello darkness, my all too familiar friend. Needing a win to keep pace in the NFC playoff chase, the Cowboys needed to pull off an upset. Instead, fans were upset. The Cowboys rolled into the Mile High City only to be trampled by the Denver Broncos. Dak Prescott’s MVP candidacy likely came to a screeching halt after a poor performance where his streak of at least three touchdown passes and zero interceptions was snapped.
Conditions were not ideal, but Prescott wasn’t making matters any better. His two interceptions took potential points off the board for a team that needed a shootout just to have an outside chance of winning. That said, it wasn’t only Prescott responsible for the team’s struggles; many other factors contributed to the embarrassing loss. Here are three more reasons why Dallas lost against Denver.
Penalties
Playing against a quality opponent in a hostile environment, the Cowboys needed to be at their best to play sound football. Dallas failed at that, which resulted in a sloppy performance throughout. Being undermanned and getting beaten between the whistles is somewhat understandable, but what cannot be excused is that they failed to limit pre-snap penalties.
After Trikweze Bridges’ interception of Bo Nix, the Cowboys started off with a promising drive to open the game and were on the doorstep of taking a 7-0 lead. That is, until Tyler Guyton had a false start penalty when Dallas had 3rd-and-goal from the one-yard line. Technically, the penalty was called on Brock Hoffman, but video evidence clearly shows Guyton moving before the snap to force the Cowboys in 3rd-and-goal from the 6-yard line, ultimately resulting in a field goal versus a touchdown.
On Dallas’ next drive, Guyton had a false start penalty that placed Dallas in second and long after a positive gain by Javonte Williams. The drive then stalled after Guyton allowed a sack on Dak Prescott as it was not a very disciplined sequence of plays for Guyton.
Also, edge rusher James Houston had a brutal offsides penalty. Had it not been for Houston lining up offside, the Cowboys would have forced Denver to punt and had the opportunity to take a two-score lead, potentially changing the course of the entire game. That’s just a few early examples of Dallas’ lack of attention to detail hurting them almost as badly as the Broncos could have. In all, Dallas committed nine penalties for 80 yards of field position. The only penalty that resulted in a positive outcome was Sam Williams’ unnecessary roughness penalty, which tempted the Broncos to attempt a two-conversion, which failed. The Cowboys were beating themselves.
A defenseless defense
Where do we start? Yes, the Dallas secondary is very depleted. Trevon Diggs was placed on injured reserve on Saturday, Juanyeh Thomas was inactive as was Donovan Wilson, but still the secondary is not performing even at an acceptable level given the circumstances. Despite getting an interception, Bridges was often picked on by Bo Nix and allowed multiple touchdowns in pass coverage. Also, the secondary cannot seem to get on the right page in zone coverage.
Countless times this season we’ve seen the secondary lose a receiver in zone coverage, and the players on the field look confused as to whose assignment it was to pick up someone running uncovered in the secondary. A prime example was Dallas having Denver backed up on 1st-and-20 from the Dallas 25-yard line. No problem for Nix and company. The Cowboys lost Troy Franklin in the middle of their zone defense, and he caught an uncontested touchdown in the middle of the end zone.
Furthermore, the secondary allowed too many runs by Denver to be bounced outside for big gains. RJ Harvey had a 40-yard score on a toss play, and JK Dobbins saw plenty of green grass outside the tackle box when Dallas cornerbacks failed to funnel the runs back inside. The front seven isn’t off the hook either. The linebackers didn’t do a good job with their eye discipline, and because of it, it opened up holes in the zone defense for Denver’s play-action passes. Lastly, as a unit, Dallas recorded zero sacks, and Nix was very comfortable in picking apart a wounded defense.
Coaching
Brian Schottenheimer didn’t put his players in enough positions to be successful Sunday. It starts from the beginning. Once CeeDee Lamb beat Riley Moss for a 29-yard gain to the Denver 3-yard line, and Javonte Williams got to the 1-yard line on first down, the natural process would be to run it again with Williams behind Dallas’ good run-blocking interior. Instead, Schottenheimer opted to get too cute and pass on a well-covered play by Denver which ultimately led to Guyton’s false start penalty.
At the very least, you could’ve designed the play-action pass to get one of the backs or tight ends in the flat near the front pylon, but it appears Schottenheimer outsmarted himself. Then later, with his team down 30-17 and facing 4th-and-6 near midfield, Schottenheimer elected to punt instead of going for it on fourth down.
Not sure why that would be the wise decision, considering how bad the defense has played up until that point. To no one’s surprise, the defense allowed the Broncos to go 12 plays for 85 yards and add another score that effectively sealed the Cowboys’ fate. Schottenheimer has done a good job until this point in his first season as head coach, but he coached much too conservatively against Denver and overthought the most obvious and easy answers.
