Dallas Cowboys defense overcomes Dak Prescott again

The Dallas Cowboys spent years trying to fix what had been a broken defense. At last it appears they’ve finally done it as Thursday night showed.

Hosting the hottest offense in football in the New Orleans Saints, the plucky group like by Demarcus Lawrence and Leighton Vander Esche gave Drew Brees and his arsenal problems all night long. New Orleans could never find any sort of rhythm, always finding ways to bog down or shoot themselves in the foot. In the end, it wasn’t the Saints offense that almost ruined the night for Dallas. It was their quarterback.

Dak Prescott had some nice moments in the game. His rush for a 1st down while breaking multiple tackles late in the 4th quarter was especially good. However, that doesn’t overshadow his brutally timed fumble in the red zone that almost cost his team the game. It was his 11th fumble of the season. Another sign that despite his leadership qualities, he’s a weak link of this team. Somebody who’s just along for the ride.

This is an old school team. They run the ball with Ezekiel Elliott and now they can play great defense. It should be enough to get them the NFC East crown. A Super Bowl? That’s hard to envision if Prescott keeps playing like this.

Cowboys have perfected the art of winning ugly in 2018

This is not to say it’s impossible. Prescott can play efficiently in games and is unselfish enough to manage things rather than trying to be the focal point. Teams have won championships with this current blueprint before. The problem is it just feels like at some point the Cowboys will have to ask their quarterback to win a shootout for them and it doesn’t seem like he’s up to the task.

It seems like this team is built to win their games ugly. They’ll be close for the most part and could swing a number of different ways but they have that knack for hanging on just enough to pull it out. It’s a hard thing to keep up for months at a time though. Sooner or later it can start to wear on a defense that has to be on the field a lot. Can Jason Garrett find them some relief beyond running the ball a ton? He better or this shocking turnaround may have a bittersweet ending.