Cowboys are perfecting a fine formula for winning without Dak Prescott | Opinion
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – That was a familiar face in the middle of the euphoria in the visitor’s locker room at SoFi Stadium. The face, ear-to-ear grin, burst of energy, this all belonged to Dak Prescott.
Prescott missed his fourth consecutive game on Sunday, and for the fourth consecutive game, the Dallas Cowboys won without their franchise quarterback.
After Dallas toppled the Los Angeles Rams 22-10 behind fill-in quarterback Cooper Rush, there was barely a hint of ego from Prescott as he worked the room and congratulated teammates, dressed in a team-issued warmup suit and ballcap.
“I feel great!” Prescott told Paste BN Sports, beaming. It’s still unclear whether Prescott will make it back for next weekend’s NFC East showdown against the Philadelphia Eagles as he rehabs from surgery to mend his broken thumb.
“Honestly, just knowing this team can win in a multitude of ways. Whether it’s the run game, the defense. Obviously, we all know what we can do when we’re healthy in the pass game. It’s exciting as hell. Coach (Mike McCarthy) has the mantra, ‘resiliency’ for this team. And if you turn on the tape, you can see it game in and game out.”
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The Cowboys (4-1) have not only discovered the formula for winning without Prescott. They’ve mastered it. At least that was the case against the swooning Rams (2-3), whose struggles on offense played right into the matchup hands of a dominating defense.
Rush won again, and again, he blew no one away by creating plays with his legs. He had pedestrian numbers, at least by the standards of the ever-evolving NFL passing game (and for fantasy geeks). He threw just 16 times, completing 10 passes for 102 yards – for the whole game – as he handed off the ball a lot to Ezekiel Elliott and Tony Pollard. The Cowboys ran 34 times for 163 yards and got a highlight from the running game when Pollard ripped off a 57-yard score in the second quarter.
Just as essential to the run-pass flow, Rush marked his fourth straight game without committing a turnover. Never mind that Rush hasn’t put up a 300-yard game, with the passing total on Sunday lower than in any of the starts this season. This is how you can win in the NFL: Don’t lose by killing yourself with turnovers.
“We’re not going to beat ourselves,” defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence told Paste BN Sports.
Lawrence, who opened the scoring by scooping up a Matthew Stafford fumble and racing 19 yards for a touchdown – turnovers, you see – loves this formula that works so much better with a defense as potent as the unit that Dallas has grown into. The Cowboys sacked Stafford five times and forced the beleaguered Rams quarterback into three turnovers – an interception, plus two fumbles – to stamp the effort.
“Good complementary football,” Lawrence said.
Lawrence knew what some of the experts declared (ah-hem) after Prescott suffered his injury during the Week 1 loss against Tampa Bay. Some thought that despite the presence of one of the NFL’s best defenses, the Cowboys would be doomed without Prescott – i.e. with Rush inserted and other pieces from last season’s top-ranked unit gone.
Well, Doomsday it has not been.
“We knew Cooper Rush had our back since Day 1,” Lawrence said. “That’s why I feel like every year the coaching staff was getting him back to be our backup quarterback. We trust him.”
And that trust is certainly growing to the point that Rush makes it cool to be a game manager.
What’s so special about Rush?
“His calmness,” Will McClay, the Cowboys vice president-personnel, told Paste BN Sports. “Just to feel like ‘I belong,’ and feel like he can make guys believe in him. He calms everyone down. He communicates everything. He’s been around for (several) years. And everyone follows him because he knows what he’s doing.”
The games just get bigger, considering varying degrees. When the Cowboys beat Cincinnati in Week 2, it was a matter of getting a jolt of oxygen to revive the season after Prescott went down. Then it was back-to-back division wins. Now it’s beating the defending champs. And next up is Philadelphia, the NFL’s only undefeated team ... with first place in the division up for grabs.
That will be the biggest test yet for Rush – if Prescott isn’t back for the NFC East showdown.
Of course, Jerry Jones had a spin on the latest W. The flamboyant Cowboys owner said that beating the Rams was a “jewelry game,” presumably because L.A. has the most recent championship hardware.
Yet Jones also expressed an appreciation for the nuts-and-bolts of Dallas’ formula for winning without Prescott. Rush, a fifth-year pro from Central Michigan who entered the NFL as an undrafted free agent, trained for his success the old-school way.
There used to be a time when most quarterbacks prepared to play by spending years on the bench as an understudy. Now it’s more common for young quarterbacks to hit the field early in their careers.
“It says they were righter than you thought they were, to let them sit there and soak it up with osmosis,” Jones told Paste BN Sports after leaving the locker room. “This does give you a chance when you’re called upon. So, a guy that’s been sitting around in every meeting and good at it – that’s what Dak was telling us, ‘Jerry, this guy’s a quarterback’ – can give you a chance.”
Let’s not forget that Prescott’s journey included him starting as a rookie. But as the Cowboys formula has worked in recent weeks, they have embraced the idea of finding a different way to win.