Blogging The Boys
If every game in the Brian Schottenheimer era is going to be like this, Dallas Cowboys fans will need to start cutting out caffeine on Sundays.
After last week’s league kickoff game went right down to the wire and featured an opening drive with a bizarre penalty, the Cowboys’ home opener went pretty much the same way. Bizarre penalties on the opening drive were just the start of a nail-biter against the New York Giants that was settled in overtime, with Dallas winning 40-37.
The Giants started with the ball, and a flag was thrown on the very first play, as New York was called for holding on the kickoff return. But it was left tackle James Hudson, getting the start in place of the injured Andrew Thomas, who quickly became the center of attention.
As the Giants moved down the field, a 10-yard run from rookie Cam Skattebo was wiped out due to an unnecessary roughness penalty on Hudson, who had previously been flagged for holding. The penalty itself was truly absurd.
It didn’t stop there, though. Three plays later, Hudson drew another unnecessary roughness penalty after a 50-yard pass from Russell Wilson, which backed the Giants up from the Dallas 2-yard line to the 17. Two plays after that, Hudson drew a false start, making him the first player this century to be penalized four times in one drive.
The rash of penalties caught up to the Giants, and they had to settle for a field goal on the opening drive. Hudson was ultimately benched, which led to a shouting match between him and head coach Brian Daboll on the sideline, officially one-upping the Jalen Carter spit take from last week’s game in terms of being truly bizarre.
As disastrous as that opening drive was for the Giants, it didn’t stop them from taking the Cowboys to the cleaners the rest of the first half. The offense went three-and-out on their first two drives while the defense gave up chunk plays on every drive to Russell Wilson, who put up a career-best performance before the day was over.
A touchdown pass to KaVontae Turpin on a free play made things close, cutting the deficit to 13-10, but Dallas horribly botched their chance for another score right before halftime too. Overall, it was a very poorly executed first half of football on both sides, but the Cowboys looked worse.
For the most part, that continued to be the case in the second half. Dak Prescott threw an interception off his back foot on the second play of the third quarter, which turned into a touchdown for the Giants. Then things clicked for the offense, as they would score on each of their next five drives.
It started with yet another Javonte Williams touchdown, though two big penalties from the Giants helped the Cowboys get in range. After a Brandon Aubrey field goal, Miles Sanders got in for his first touchdown as a Cowboy, with more Giants penalties helping them...
