Blogging The Boys
With last Thursday night’s loss at the Detroit Lions, the Dallas Cowboys are 0-2-1 against the NFC North this season, and have their final opportunity to get a win against the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday night. The best division in football from a year ago has given the Cowboys a lot of trouble in 2025 and is a big reason they still have a lot of work to do catching the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC East.
The Eagles also lost to the Bears on Black Friday like the Cowboys did in week three, but beat a Packers team the Cowboys managed a tie against and won at the Vikings 28-22 in week seven. The Cowboys need to hold serve against the Vikings and win playing against J.J. McCarthy. When Philly beat Minnesota, it was against their own former QB Carson Wentz. Now, Dallas gets McCarthy coming off his third win of the season in his seventh start, and first three touchdown game of his career against Dan Quinn’s Washington Commanders.
For the Cowboys to keep playoff hopes alive they will need their defense to fully seize the opportunity to make McCarthy struggle, he’s thrown four interceptions in three road starts this season, and help the team win should they have another big offensive output after losing despite scoring 30 points at the Lions for the first time all season.
The Vikings own defense will be looking to have a big say in how much they can slow the Cowboys down, coming off their second shutout in three seasons under defensive coordinator Brian Flores. The Vikings defense has only allowed over 28 points once this season, but the team sits at 5-8. The story of the Cowboys season has been the defense letting the offense down, and the story for the Vikings has been the exact opposite with the offense not doing enough to win with their defense.
The Cowboys have plenty of corrections to make in all three phases to win their matchups against the Vikings and get their first home win against the purple-clad squad since 2013. Playing in primetime for the final time this season where they are 1-3-1, it’s time for our weekly look at what the Cowboys must do to get win number two under the lights and get back over .500.
Dallas has done very well to upgrade their defensive front with the addition of Quinnen Williams to join other newly acquired players Kenny Clark and Solomon Thomas, along with Osa Odighizuwa on the interior.
There is a very high level of variance when it comes to how many defensive alignments and philosophies are being played in the league right now, but the desire to win with four up front is pretty strongly shared throughout. The Cowboys have brought in the personnel to believe in their front to win consistently, and doing so to collapse the pocket...
