Cowboys red zone woes make way for late Commanders touchdown to finish season on 23-19 loss
The Dallas Cowboys season ended nearly the same way it began, with a white flag. The illusion of trying to win. A whimper. The final on-field moment was KaVontae Turpin stepping harmlessly out of bounds on a kickoff with no time left, ending a 23-19 Washington Commanders win from AT&T Stadium. There was no razzle-dazzle drawn up by John Fassel to even give Turpin an option to keep the ball alive, nor the thought of taking a touchback and letting the offense have the final chance at scoring with one play left.
Win or lose, the story of the 2024 Cowboys had already been written well before the Commanders came in and added to their momentum before the playoffs with a second straight win. All the final 60 minutes of football did was confirm many of the things that have already been realized about this team, although QB Trey Lance making his first start with the team provided an interesting wrinkle, especially early on.
The Cowboys finished out the 2024 season with just two home wins, against the Giants and Buccaneers. Tampa Bay was also playing in the early window and clinched their fourth straight NFC South title with a win over the Saints, perhaps making the Cowboys victory over them the win of the season for Mike McCarthy’s team in primetime. It was also the last win the Cowboys would get this season, giving up a touchdown to Terry McLaurin with two seconds left in Week 18 to drop their chance at finishing with a win and sweeping the Commanders.
The Cowboys showed much more fight than in their most recent 41-7 road loss at the Philadelphia Eagles, but certainly not in a way that will make anything from this game memorable in the long run. This entire 2024 season was one to forget, and the most consistently memorable thing will be uncompetitive losses that piled up early even when the team had more starters available. The ramifications of these ten losses will be realized as the offseason comes to an untimely start, with some of the good and bad that Dallas has to work with moving forward on display against Washington.
For the final time this season, let’s get to a few notes from this Cowboys loss.
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One of the biggest talking points around the league here in the final week of the regular season, where many teams were resting starters and already looking ahead to either the playoffs or offseason, was individual player incentives adding a bit of intrigue to the matchups. Although not chasing an incentive, Cowboys star pass rusher Micah Parsons did have a statistic that only Hall of Fame defensive end Reggie White could claim until Sunday. With sacks on two of the game’s first three plays, Parsons upped his season total to 12 later on with a half sack. He became the only player alongside White to reach at least 12 sacks in each of his first four seasons. Parsons did so in just 13 games, not missing a beat going from Dan Quinn’s scheme to Mike Zimmer’s in 2024.
Parsons has yet again been vocal about wanting Zimmer to return as defensive coordinator, much like he did before Quinn ultimately left for the Commanders job. As one of the clearest examples of a player that never quit on this season and is capable of executing his role in the defense no matter the scheme, Parsons may not have to look too hard to find teammates that also want Zimmer back for a second year, but regardless of what happens, the more important thing is Dallas knows they have a true franchise player to build the defense around. This season was always going to be about relying on established stars to carry an unfair amount of weight on both sides of the ball, and Micah Parsons still being awesome until the very end is at least something to smile about going into the offseason.
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The difference in level of play from the entire defensive front, from players like Osa Odighizuwa and Chauncey Golston having career years, was extremely noticeable in the games played since Parsons returned from injury in week nine.
Parsons’ third-down sack was a great example of Zimmer knowing how to get his best players favorable matchups against a backup player. The Commanders were without former Cowboys center Tyler Biadasz in this game, and Parsons beat his replacement, Michael Deiter, to get a sack on third and long against Jayden Daniels.
The Cowboys did a good job of getting the Commanders into third and obvious passing situations to let their defensive line and blitz looks try to take over this game. More surprisingly, they also found ways to create big plays on offense in the first half and attack the weak spots in the Washington defense to complement this defensive effort and lead 6-3 at the break. With Zimmer having nothing to hold back in a game without playoff implications for his side, even a narrow 3-0 lead was enough to send Donovan Wilson on a blitz on the ensuing Commanders drive on third down again, forcing another punt with a sack.
The Commanders punted on their first four possessions, but three trips into Commanders territory for the Cowboys offense only yielded six points in the first half, which left the door open for the only team still with something to play for to take the game back in the closing seconds.
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Trey Lance started his first ever game for the Cowboys and first since Week 16 of 2021, and despite not leading a touchdown drive until the fourth quarter, was able to show some positives that help justify why Dallas traded for him as a project quarterback. The timing of this start was a bit strange for many reasons, the one garnering the most attention being that Dallas kept Cooper Rush from reaching a playing time incentive in the final game of the season. It was also an opportunity for Lance to play within a Mike McCarthy called offense for perhaps the final time, with his abilities tailored for the West Coast system being a positive that led to trading for a former first-round pick. If this was the Cowboys way of desperately trying to show fans that McCarthy’s offense is viable enough to justify saving his job, a decision that was gaining momentum only because of the wins Rush was able to get late in the year, they at very least saw receivers like Jalen Tolbert and even KaVontae Turpin make plays.
Tolbert and Turpin went for 31 and 33 yards on back-to-back plays with Lance’s first two pass attempts. The Cowboys got Lance on the move, used play-action, and created the types of easy throws with run after the catch opportunities that must became a more consistent part of this offense no matter who is a part of it moving forward. For Lance to be at least the QB2 in 2025, he will need a contract extension as the former 49ers draft pick is set to hit unrestricted free agency. The same is true of Rush, as the Cowboys foremost priority of building a dynamic offense around the returning Prescott will also be met with the need to secure the future behind a QB that’s missed at least one start in four of his last five seasons.
After the Cowboys loss in Philadelphia, getting any meaningful evaluation on the wide receiver position felt lost for the year without Lamb. This being one of the most critical spots for the Cowboys to look for upgrades in the offseason, they at least squeezed in some meaningful reps for Tolbert, Turpin, Jalen Brooks, and Jonathan Mingo in the last four quarters of the season. Brooks should have put the Cowboys in a first and goal situation on their opening drive, but his 13 yard catch was negated by a Tyler Guyton penalty that backed Dallas up into an eventual field goal try. This also led to Guyton again playing in a platoon at the left tackle spot, one of the more puzzling decisions the Cowboys made all season even when out of playoff contention to possibly stunt the growth of their most recent first-round pick.
The biggest void left behind is the Cowboys’ inability to finish in the red zone, where a lack of a push in the run game paired with low percentage throws that couldn’t be bailed out by the likes of Brandin Cooks or Jake Ferguson saw Dallas come up empty on one red zone trip and kick field goals on four others.
Just how the slight element of surprise the Cowboys threw at the Commanders with Lance at QB led to some early success, the Commanders (for different reasons entirely) turned to their backup QB Marcus Mariota in the second half for some of the same. Resting Jayden Daniels before his first career playoff start next weekend, Mariota came in and immediately gave the Cowboys defense trouble. He went 5-5 on a quick eight play drive after the Cowboys started the second half with another Brandon Aubrey field goal to put the Commanders in the end zone on Zach Ertz’s touchdown.
The Cowboys would answer with another field goal to reclaim the lead at 12-10, but Mariota again had an answer by capping off an identical eight-play, 70-yard drive with his own rushing touchdown. This time, the Cowboys responded with their only touchdown of the game, finishing in the red zone on third and goal from the two. Dallas’ third straight tight run up the middle went to Rico Dowdle, and after being stopped on second down he got in for his second rushing touchdown of the year. Dallas’ defense repeated their routine of being able to get pressure playing from ahead again, forcing a three and out with two more sacks. Chauncey Golston was in on both of them with Osa Odighizuwa also getting credited for half a sack on third and long.
The Cowboys’ play-calling had trended towards conservative as the game wore down though, and playing to protect the lead they could not manage a first down of their own to prevent Mariota from getting another chance. Untimely penalties being another 2024 theme, the Cowboys missed a chance to put the Commanders in third down after a Donovan Wilson sack was negated by his own facemask penalty. Terry McLaurin was called on to convert a later third down on the drive, and then Mariota struck again with his legs to make the backbreaking play on fourth-and-1 near midfield.
The Cowboys came out expecting the Commanders to be conservative and run for the first down, possibly use their final timeout, and then look to get further into field goal range with a fresh set of downs. They lined up Carlos Watkins and Jordan Phillips as their defensive tackles for this critical, potential game-winning snap, and even after a timeout stuck with these two tackles which was quite interesting to see. Had the play been a run up the middle, it may have been the right call as the Dallas front got a push, but instead Mariota kept the ball and got around Marist Liufau on the edge for a gain of 33 yards. Three plays later, McLaurin was in the end zone to send the Commanders into the playoffs happy and the Cowboys home as losers, catching a fade against DaRon Bland.
Bland and Liufau had both been playing admirably well for a Cowboys defense with so many injuries around these players forced into key roles without much surrounding help, but this lack of true difference-making ability was evident when a star receiver like McLaurin got the best of them in the game’s biggest moment.
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The Commanders split the season series with the Cowboys with both teams winning on the road. Seeing the Eagles reclaim the division is one thing for a Cowboys team that was never on the same plane as Philadelphia this season, but having a chance to sweep the upstart, surprising Commanders team also going to the playoffs out of the NFC East and having it slip away is another. Quite literally, the New York Giants losing more games than ever before in the 100 year history of their franchise was the only thing that saved the Cowboys from being totally lapped by the entire field of their closest rivals. A Cowboys road win on a Thursday night at the Giants in week four was the only fleeting moment where talking about saving the season felt realistic from a playoffs standpoint, and even that felt uneasy after an ugly 20-15 win. It was also a win against the Giants on Thanksgiving that got the Cowboys off the hook of not having a home win all the way through Week 13.
This loss pushed the Cowboys scoring differential at home in 2024 to 274 for their opponents and 161 for them, a number inflated more by early and midseason blowouts compared to this four-point loss. It was the closest home loss since a Week 3 loss by a field goal to the Ravens, a game the visiting team led 28-6 in the second half.
The Cowboys sure found a lot of interesting and mostly frustrating ways to arrive at the same conclusions this season, and Sunday was no different. This was not a team capable of making the game-deciding plays in those moments, a question left unanswered without even the thought of a playoff game this time to realize the inevitable. The offseason comes as a welcome chance to reset and evaluate, although as always it feels like the Cowboys will find a way to do a whole lot more than that.
As I always do at the end of each season, however it may come, I’d like to take a brief second to thank anyone that followed along with mine or my colleagues work here at Blogging The Boys. Having a community through football is a great feeling regardless of any game outcome, and the same is true of how humbling it is to be trusted with having an analytical eye towards America’s Team. This season, we lost one of our own in my former podcast co-host Mark Lane to add to the challenges. There were many moments watching the Cowboys in 2024 where I thought to myself how much I would have loved to discuss what is going on with Mark, but I know I am not alone in using his legacy as motivation to continue forward – which we will all do. With a notebook full of each week’s game notes, stay posted for more roster analysis, coaching staff discussion, and of course free agency and draft coverage when the time comes. And there it is.
