Blogging The Boys
The Dallas Cowboys will play their next two games against opponents from the NFC North, the best division in football a year ago which put three of its four teams in the playoffs. This Sunday’s opponent, the Chicago Bears, was the one that missed out on the playoffs, going 5-12 with rookie quarterback Caleb Williams. Twelve of these games (four wins, eight losses) came under current Cowboys defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus.
The Cowboys need to avoid getting caught looking ahead to their second primetime game of the season in week four versus Micah Parsons and the Packers. They must handle the emotions of drawing a winless team for the second week in a row, this time on the road, desperate for a win under first-year head coach Ben Johnson. The Bears competed well in the first Monday Night Football game of the season but lost the lead in the second half versus the Vikings, then were blown out at the Lions, 52-21, last week.
Starting with an Eberflus defense that was just shredded by the Giants in week two is an easy place to begin breaking down this game, but it loses sight of the matchup where the Cowboys will have most of their best players on the field, against a defense with some obvious weaknesses to exploit. If not for Eberflus’ defense conceding explosive plays and points at will to Russell Wilson, the story out of the Cowboys’ first win would be much more of Dak Prescott having another dominant performance against a divisional opponent and lighting up the scoreboard at home. Prescott did this anyway by having to put the offense on his shoulders in the game’s biggest moments and make clutch throws.
The Cowboys offensive game plan against the Giants to get Brian Schottenheimer his first win had to make a lot of adjustments. Through it all they stuck to their new identity and stayed patient with motions and trying to spread the ball around, but compared to the huge chunks the Giants were getting in the pass game, the Cowboys nearly fell short of keeping up. Although they’ll be expecting a much more stout effort from their defense in this department against the Bears, one of the best things the Cowboys can get out of this game is another efficient game from Prescott with more big plays to CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens.
What else do the Cowboys need to do to earn their second win, and what could derail their efforts in Chicago? Welcome back to our weekly win or lose scenarios for week three, the Cowboys’ first appearance on FOX’s America’s Game of the Week for 2025.
The Cowboys’ passing attack has taken an interesting hierarchy through two games this season. Lamb leading the team in targets comes as no surprise, but second is tight end Jake Ferguson. KaVontae Turpin...
