'Complementary Football!' Cowboys Key at Giants; Blueprint vs. Jets?
"Complementary football.'' Those two words astutely depict how the Dallas Cowboys played against the New York Giants on Sunday night. ... and they happen to be two of coach Mike McCarthy's favorite words - words he'd like to see in play again in Week 2.
In Dallas' 40-0 win, the defense brought the pain (and points), while the offense did its part by managing the game and keeping the scoreboard ticking over while protecting the football.
"I feel like we did a good job," Tony Pollard said of his unit. "We didn't have our best game on offense, but we did a good job of playing complementary football. The defense, when they're clicking like that, it doesn't take much from the offense. I feel like we did a good job of keeping the momentum going and getting drives when we could."
Pollard is right. Offensively, the Cowboys didn't have the best night statistically ... but they didn't need to.
For all the Cowboy haters stating that Dak Prescott didn't do enough in the pouring rain at MetLife Stadium, the truth is, he did his job extremely well.
For the naysayers, let's dive into the Cowboys' offensive performance, shall we?
In the first three possessions (first half), Dak led scoring drives in each of them, and Dallas only had one three-and-out for the first half. Then, with the first possession of the second half, Prescott led a 10-play drive that ended with a one-yard Pollard touchdown.
So that's four scoring drives on five possessions. But wait, there's more.
On the following Cowboys possession, a false start by Terence Steele halted the drive and forced a Bryan Anger punt. But then, after a turnover on downs by the Giants offense at the 50-yard line, Prescott, with a short field, went to work and led an eight-play drive that resulted in KaVontae Turpin's first NFL touchdown.
It was then that Dallas and Prescott put the cue in the rack. Their night's work was done with the scoreboard reading 40-0 while playing mistake-free football and managing the game near-perfectly. (No, there's no such thing as "perfect,'' but it was darn close).
So, of Dallas' first seven drives, Prescott and the offense scored on five of them, including three touchdowns and two field goals before Cooper Rush took over with 11 minutes remaining in the fourth quarter.
Dak and the offense scored 27 points ... in torrential rain. And Prescott set a personal mark of sorts for speed-reading in the pocket of the "Texas Coast Offense.'' Is that enough?
For Pollard, who amassed 70 rushing yards and two touchdowns on 14 carries, it was good to get back into the groove of a regular season game.
"I feel like it was a pretty decent performance in my first game back," Pollard said before unleashing an accidental pun. "Just getting my feet wet."
It was a good all-around performance from the Cowboys, and now they get ready for the home opener against the Aaron Rodgers-less New York Jets in the hopes of, again, playing complementary football.
