For the second straight week, the Dallas Cowboys found a way to win a game they probably shouldn’t have.
Dallas improved to 3-2 and stayed one game back of Washington in the NFC East. They also moved a half-game ahead of the idle Eagles, who had a bye this week.
Dak Prescott engineered a great final drive and capped it with a touchdown throw to Jalen Tolbert.
However, just two plays earlier, a Rico Dowdle fumble nearly ended the game with a Cowboys’ loss. Prescott just barely beat a Steelers’ defender to the loose ball and kept the Cowboys’ hopes alive.
Prescott ended the game with 352 yards and two touchdowns along with two interceptions, and that huge fumble recovery.
Tolbert had seven catches for 87 yards along with the game-winner. Dowdle had his best-game ever, despite the fumble, with 87 yards on 20 carries and a 22-yard touchdown reception.
The win moved Dallas to 18-16 all-time against Pittsburgh with the teams tied at nine wins each in games played with the Steelers as the home team.
The biggest positive is Dallas’ rediscovery of its running game. They will need that improvement to continue going forward.
The final drive by Prescott was a much-needed confidence boost as well.
The biggest negative was the continued additions to the injury report. Marshawn Kneeland went down with what looked to be a serious leg injury.
Dallas is already far too thin at the edge position as it is.
Left Tackle Tyler Guyton also went down with a leg injury, but unlike Kneeland, Guyton at least walked off the field to the locker room.
Scoragami Update
Sunday night’s final score of 20-17 was the 23rd time a Cowboys’ contest had ended in such a score.
Dallas is now 12-11 in those 23 games. They’ve also won four straight games when the final score was 20-17.
Oddly enough, they have won those four games over the last four seasons, one win each year at that.
It’s also the fifth straight year that Dallas has had a game end at 20-17. They lost a 20-17 game in the 2020 season opener against the Rams in Los Angeles.
No Fun League? Yes, Please
Apparently, the NFL has finally had enough with certain types of post-play celebrations.
They’ve been fining players for said gestures. Now, the officials are throwing flags on them, especially those involving acting like you’re shooting a weapon.
Frankly, it’s long overdue.
Call me old-school if you like. But I’m from the school of thought that says: “Act like you’ve done it before and are going to do it again soon.”
Do we really need the staged touchdown celebrations? The entire defensive running the length of the field to mug for a camera?
The stupid dances when someone makes a tackle?
No, we don’t. It’s called “unsportsmanlike conduct” for a reason.
It’s time for a lot more “sportsmanlike conduct” and a lot less of the show-boating nonsense.
This is one of the rare times I want to see the league cracking down on something. I just hope they continue to do so.
Speaking of stupid celebrations…
Dez Bryant Isn’t Having It
Former Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant wasn’t having any of South Carolina defensive end Dylan Stewart’s sack celebration on Saturday.
Bryant took to Twitter/X to express his displeasure with the celebration:
I’m all for turning up and celebrating but this shit right here is very unacceptable!!! https://t.co/5UN5fkkgJF
— Dez Bryant (@DezBryant) October 5, 2024
It should be noted that the Gamecocks were trailing Ole Miss 24-3 at the time. South Carolina would go on to lose the game.
But most of the post-game conversation was focused on Stewart’s misdeed.
Mimicking firing multiple rounds from a shotgun into the face of a player – or any human being in any situation – is never acceptable.
Bryant would go on to state that he would have benched Stewart. One hopes the Gamecocks’ coaching staff and the SEC will take severe disciplinary action to ensure Stewart does not repeat that behavior.
Hopefully, a stern penalty will discourage others from doing something similarly boneheaded.
Black Saturday For Ranked Teams
To be honest, Alabama had no business leaping over Texas in last week’s poll.
They barely held on to beat Georgia. Nor do they look like a team that can win the title in January.
A fact they proved on Saturday night by losing to unranked Vanderbilt, 40-35.
But we all know too well why Alabama jumped Texas – despite the Longhorns also winning the week before in impressive fashion.
It’s the same reason why Alabama only dropped to seventh in this week’s poll despite getting upended by an unranked team.
The Tide still has to navigate games at Tennessee, at LSU, and at Oklahoma. There’s at least one loss in that mix.
Which will make it interesting to see how the selection committee twists itself into enough of a pretzel to get a two-loss Alabama team into the playoffs.
But the Crimson Tide were not alone in what proved to be a black Saturday for many ranked teams in college football.
The Vols got upended by Arkansas in another SEC upset. Michigan got knocked off by Washington.
USC got dumped by Minnesota and Texas A&M beat Missouri to close out the SEC’s upset trifecta.
Miami nearly joined the parade. The Hurricanes needed to rally from a 35-10 deficit to nip Cal, 38-35.
Miami also needed a little temporary blindness from the officials, who missed several offensive players downfield too early on the game-winning touchdown.
Targeting Needs To Be Targeted For Deletion
The targeting rule in college football needs to be fixed.
By fixed, I mean thrown out of the rule book all together. The rule is far too subjective and isn’t being called consistently.
Just this weekend there were targeting calls enforced that weren’t targeting.
There were more than a few hits that should have been called targeting and weren’t.
The cherry on top of this odious parfait is that, depending on when the call is made, some players can miss three-plus quarters while other barely miss two.
Just make it a 15-yard penalty and move on. Or, if you really want to end players using the helmet as a weapon, don’t play with helmets at all.
Trust me, that will put an end to players lowering their heads in a big hurry.