DALLAS — As the old saying goes, you can throw the book out when the Dallas Cowboys and the Pittsburgh Steelers get together, and the Week 5 contest was no different. The Sunday night into Monday morning clash between the two storied rivals turned into another classic as the Cowboys came away with an improbable 20-17 win in Pittsburgh.
Teams won’t win many games when they turn the ball over three times, including twice in the red zone. Leaving points on the field is usually a recipe for disaster. It’s also hard to win when your team commits 11 penalties, yet for the second week in a row, the Cowboys managed to overcome the mental errors and earn a victory. Rarely do teams win when they have glaring special teams miscues, such as a blocked field goal, but Dallas prevailed.
Teams should win when you outgain your opponent in yards by almost 2 to 1, however, and it shouldn’t be a struggle. But with all of the miscues on a soggy field after a delay of more than an hour, that’s what the Cowboys experienced.
Yet with everything seemingly going against them, and despite their best efforts to give the game away, the Cowboys played their best football when they needed it most to leave Pittsburgh with a win.
Miscues make it close.
The highs and lows of being a Cowboys fan were all on display in the sloppy Week 5 win, and it was sourced from the likeliest lightning rod for the team, quarterback Dak Prescott. For much of the contest, Prescott was brilliant, throwing for 352 yards and two touchdowns against a defense that was near the top of the league in defending the pass.
But the veteran signal-caller was one of the main reasons why the game was close, despite the Cowboys’ statistical dominance. Prescott fumbled away an opportunity to put points on the board late in the first quarter due to a lack of pocket awareness.
On third-and-6 from the Steeler 11-yard line, Prescott sat in the pocket while being pressured and, instead of throwing the ball away, scrambling for whatever yards could be salvaged, or accepting his fate and taking a sack, Prescott ultimately chose the worst option. Any other decision would have been better than staying in the pocket and fumbling away a chance at points.
Prescott made another gaffe when he threw his worst pass of the game near the end of the second quarter. On a second-and-4 from the Steeler 15-yard line, the QB threw the ball right to a Pittsburgh defender playing zone defense. It might have been a miscommunication with his intended receiver, CeeDee Lamb, but it was a poor decision from Prescott and yet more potential points were extinguished.
The third big mistake came in the fourth quarter with the Cowboys seemingly in control of the game after taking a 13-10 lead. On a first down throw, Prescott tried to test the Pittsburgh defense deep, but the ball was thrown into double coverage and was intercepted. There was no reason for Prescott to attempt the throw when the Cowboys were moving the ball well on the ground and through intermediate passes. The Steelers turned that turnover into a touchdown and the lead late in the game.
Prescott comes through
Dallas was down, but not out. Prescott would eventually redeem himself with a game-winning touchdown drive. The Cowboys got the ball back with 4:56 seconds left and needing a touchdown, and the newly minted $60 million QB showed why he was paid all that money.
Prescott led the offense on a 15-play, 70-yard drive that took 4:36 off the clock to take the lead. On the possession, Prescott went 5-for-7 for 48 yards and threw the winning four-yard touchdown on a do-or-die fourth down to wide receiver Jalen Tolbert. The scoring toss was a thing of beauty as Prescott drifted left to stay away from the pressure and then threw in the perfect spot for Tolbert.
The winning touchdown was also only the second biggest play that Prescott had on the drive. Two plays earlier, running back Rico Dowdle fumbled at the one-yard line and Prescott’s heads-up play to fall on the ball gave the Cowboys a chance to win the game.
After a game where Prescott looked great, except for three plays that could’ve lost it for Dallas, the much-maligned QB came through with the game-winning drive. When the Cowboys needed him most, Prescott was the leader they needed.
The win wasn’t all on Prescott, there were other significant contributors, but when the QB takes most of the blame, he deserves credit for his resiliency and coming up big in the clutch situations. Those are the moments that garnered Prescott faith from the organization and respect in the locker room.
Emerging threats on offense
The Week 5 win was also a game where the Cowboys might have found two new key pieces to the offense. Running back Dowdle seized his opportunity for more of a featured role by churning out 114 total yards and a score. Dowdle showed toughness on his way to 87 yards rushing against a defense that allowed under that amount on the season.
Tolbert, meanwhile, emerged as the wideout that the team hoped they were getting when they selected him in the third round in the 2022 draft. Seven catches and 87 yards were both career-highs for Tolbert, who looks very comfortable in his third season as it was his name called for the game-winning score.
A short-handed defense pitched in as well. Mike Zimmer’s unit allowed just 17 points and surrendered a measly 226 yards of total offense in the win. Without its top two defensive players, and quickly losing a third when rookie Marshawn Kneeland went out, Dallas stood tough against a physical offense that loves to challenge defenses in the run game. The Cowboys gave up just 92 yards on the ground and had three sacks, their first multiple-sack game since Week 1.
The emergence of the young players and a defense that showed up in rough circumstances won’t be how this game will be talked about. This win for the Cowboys will be remembered for how Dak Prescott came close to giving the game away, only to come up big in the key moments.
The franchise QB came through when it mattered most, and that’s why the organization gave Prescott the big bucks.
Do you think the Cowboys have found another solid receiving option after Jalen Tolbert’s career night? Share your thoughts with Ben on X (formerly Twitter) @BenGrimaldi.
