BAL 34, DAL 17: Cowboys Defense, Dez Bryant Both Missing as Ravens Roll

Dez Bryant was held out of tonight’s game between the Cowboys and Ravens after testing positive for COVID-19 within an hour of kickoff. The rest of the evening went about as expected though as Baltimore outclassed Dallas, particularly its defense, in a 34-17 victory.

The Cowboys dropped to 3-9 on the year and its bottom-ranked run defense reinforced that position, giving up 294 yards on the ground. They were giving up a league-worst 156.4 yards per game coming into Week 13.

Gus Edwards led the Baltimore rushing rampage with 101 yards on just seven carries. QB Lamar Jackson wasn’t far behind with 94 yards, part of which came form a 37-yard touchdown run in the first half.

The Cowboys offense wasn’t bad in its own right. Andy Dalton threw for 285 yards and two touchdowns and Ezekiel Elliott had 77 rushing yards on 18 carries. But they couldn’t finish drives and kept calling on Greg Zuerlein, which proved problematic tonight.

Zuerlein, who’s had a strong year overall, went 1-of-4 on field goals to help the Cowboys’ losing effort. Greg was 21-of-24 coming into the game.

The Cowboys playing poorly is no surprise in 2020. Many will likely be more disappointed by Dez Bryant’s absence, having looked forward to seeing him on the field again in his first game against Dallas.

Upset by tonight’s happenings, Bryant quickly took to social media and said he was going to “call it a quit” for this season.

The Cowboys may want to follow his lead.

Dallas’ loss comes in the same week that New York and Washington pulled off road upsets and improved to 5-7 records. The Cowboys are now three games back of the Football Team thanks to Washington’s head-to-head tiebreaker, and with only four games left the chances of catching up just became very slim.

Other Notes

Darian Thompson had an interception off a tipped pass in his return to the starting lineup. Thompson was back with the first team as Donovan Wilson sat out with a groin injury.

While quite on offense tonight, Tony Pollard had a 66-yard kickoff return to help set up Andy Dalton’s touchdown pass to Michael Gallup.

Gallup led all Dallas receivers tonight with seven catches for 86 yards. Amari Cooper caught the only other touchdown of the night for the Cowboys, which came in garbage time.

Dallas failed to register any sacks or even hits on Lamar Jackson tonight. It might have gone better if the Ravens had been forced to go to the air more, but the porous run defense allowed Jackson to only attempt 17 passes.

Tonight felt like a potential death blow for Defensive Coordinator Mike Nolan’s time with the Cowboys. The team looked lost in all facets of defense. Even if Nolan is kept through the end of the year, it’s hard to imagine Dallas retaining him after this season.